Journey To The Past
by Jezchan
Summary: Third chapter is finally up. Hope no ones 4got about my fic... this chapter may be a bit screwy to you, but to me it makes sense. Then again I know what's gonna happen :)
1. Courage Don't Desert Me

Journey To The Past   
Chapter One: "Courage don't desert me"   
By J-chan and her multiple personalities

Disclaimer: I do not own Dragon Ball Z or any of its characters. They are owned by some animation corporation that I can't spell and don't feel like looking up the name of right now. I didn't create them either, Akira Toriyama did. I do own this story however. I wrote it. Don't use it without my permission please.

*Sigh* I don't get why disclaimers are so important. No one ever actually CLAIMS to own these characters do they? *hmph*

Notes: I'm not totally sure of what happened in the Cell saga or exactly when Marai Trunks killed the jinzounigen, I did my best to keep the time line intact. Also, some characters my be a bit out of character, but I did try to keep them acting normal. Enjoy!   


* * *

_Heart don't fail me now,_   
_courage don't desert me,_   
_don't turn back now that we're here._

_People always say,_   
_life is full of choices,_   
_no one ever mentions fear._

_Or how the world can seem so vast,_   
_on a journey to the past._   
  


_Back to who I was, on to find my future,_   
_things my heart still needs to know._

_Yes let this be a sign, let this road be mine,_   
_let it lead me to my past, and bring me home,_   
_at last!_

"Hyper drive shutdown. Please fasten your seat belts. We we be landing in five minutes. I repeat; five minutes." The computer announced. 

Trunks steeled himself as he waited for the Hope to land. He knew from experiance that it would be a bumpy landing. He was returning from the past for the third time, he had gone to the past twice before. The first time to give Goku the heart medicine, and the second to help defeat the past jinzouningen, Juuhachi-gou and Juunana-gou. The artificial humans 18 and 17. 

Unbeknownst to Trunks, Dr. Gero had created yet another cyborg he hadn't known about, Cell. Cell had been put into a growth tank by Dr. Gero because Gero had known that creating Cell would take more time then he had left to live and so put his creation on automatics. Cell had emerged years later, after Trunks had destroyed the jinzounigen in his time, killing Trunks, Cell had taken the time machine to the past where the jinzouningen were still alive in hopes of absorbing them and becoming complete. 

The ugly blob had succeeded in absorbing both past jinzounigen before Trunks could kill them and become Perfect Cell. Perfect Cell was defeated by Gohan, who was eleven or so at the time. Gohan had went super saiyan level two and defeated Perfect Cell, Mr. Satan had taken all the credit for it. Then, surprisingly, both jinzouningen had redeemed themselves and joined the good guys. 

After fighting the stronger, past jinzouningen training with his father and Goku, and spending two years in the room of spirit and time Trunks had returned to his time and blasted the mirai jinzounigen into oblivion. He smirked at the thought of their dying screams. It hurt to have your flesh burned away by a ki blast, he knew from personal experiance. He'd died and been brought back to life in the alternate time line. 

Now at twenty-one years old Trunks had secretly returned a third time to make sure the jinzouningen _stayed_ good, since he had done this without his mothers knowledge - and not having very good technical skills - he had went back and then _foreward_ quite a few more years than he had the first or second time. 32 years to be exact. He had been both happy and sad to find that they had stayed good. Juuhachi-gou even had a daughter now, Juunana-gou had turned into a hermit, and Goku had simply vanished. He had been happy that the world wasn't destroyed, but sad because he now knew how his world could have been if not for the jinzouningen. 

He also wondered where Goku was. Trunks knew he hadn't seen all of the Z fighters, new and old, he had felt a few extremly high ki's that he didn't recognize, but he had never seen the faces they belonged to. 

Except one. 

A girl, the strongest of the middle ranging powers, the strongest female present, had seemed to know he was there. Trunks was sure she hadn't seen him, but she **_had_** acknowleged his presence, flying low to his hiding place and actually seeming to stare right through him at one point. She had seemed to completly forget about him when her worlds Trunks had shown up, the two had sat under a tree and talked for a while. Trunks had gotten a cramp in his leg from crouching the whole time. 

The Hope landed and Trunks stepped outside into the sun, he looked around, the time machine had landed in front of Capsule Corp. _Home._ He had never been able to go near Capsule Corp in the past, to many possible witnesses. This one was old and cracked from the various battles fought close by, run down compared to the one in the past, but it was home. Also, the country side was a bit quiet. 

Almost too quiet for a city on the brink of recovery from an apocalypse. 

It was too bad that his mothers original plan hadn't worked. Bulma had sent him to the past to stop the jinzouningen from destroying everything and save the future. She hadn't realized that that would be impossible to do. It was a paradox, a very annoying one. If the world was never destroyed then Bulma would never have sent her son back in time to stop it from being destroyed now would she? Trunks had failed to save his time but he **_had_** managed to save the pasts future. It gave him a small amount of pleasure to know he had at least helped **_some._** Past or present he had saved peoples lives. 

Plus, it had been kind of interesting to see how his alternate self would grow up. Trunks knew now that his other self would be a spoiled brat, something he'd never had the privilege of being. The jinzounigen had made sure of that. His parents-- his mother, hadn't had time to spoil him. 

"Okaasan! I'm home!" Trunks walked right inside Capsule Corp., calling out to his mother that he had returned. A frown crossed his features when he received no answer. He couldn't have missed it, the house was so still and quiet his saiyan ears could have picked up the sound of a pin dropping in the basement. "Okaasan?" 

Trunks looked around the kitchen and found the calendar, it had only been a few days since he'd left, he frowned and squinted at the date printed in bold numbers to make sure he was seeing straight, _No, years. I've been gone for three years?!_. The time machine was like that. If not programmed exactly correct, the short time he had spent in the past could be a year or more in the present. _I hope Kaasan isn't too worried._ He began looking for clues as to where, exactly, he could find his mother. 

After a thorough search of the house, Trunks still hadn't found a single thing that could tell him where his mother had gone. _Well Trunks, what did you expect? That every time she goes out she's going to leave a note? Just in case I decided to come home while she was gone?_ The second he was done processing the thought he saw a note taped on the refrigerator, mentally slapping himself for not noticing it earlier he plucked it off and read it. He reread it and reread it, getting colder and colder with each line, by the time he'd read it about ten times he was made of ice and ready to kill. 

_Ossu Trunks-chan,_   
_Thought you'd gotten rid of us ne? Wrong. It takes much more then a few swipes with a sword and a ki blast to finish us off. We have your mother, and you'll get her back on one condition._

_We want a rematch._

_We promise not to hurt her, at least not until you can hear her scream. Meet us at the place you "killed" us the first time, and we'll talk. Don't worry about us not being there. We'll sense your ki when you get back from the past. How did we know where you were? Don't worry, we didn't hurt your precious Kaasan. It's amazing what one can get out of a person using blackmail. We just threatened to destroy these blue prints she was working on for a new time machine and she spilled like a pot of over cooked rice! Looks like she was worried about you kid._   
_ Your friendly neighborhood terrorists,_   
_ Juuhachi-gou and Juunana-gou_

His veins were almost literally going from frozen rivers to streams of molten lava. _She was worried about me and was going to come see if I was okay. This is all my fault! If only I hadn't disobeyed her. She was right, whatever happens in the other timeline now is their problem. WHY didn't I LISTEN to her?_ Guilt flooded his thoughts and he crumpled the note he still held in his hands. He would kill those damned jinzounigen if it was the last thing he did. They had gone to far, they'd threatened his mothers life, the life he'd worked so hard to protect ever since he had started fighting. They would pay. They would pay dearly. 

_And this time they won't come back!_

* * *

Juuhachi-gou stared at the mess in Dr. Gero's old lab she had found, the place was completely destroyed. Roasted. toasted, and burnt to a crisp. Glancing once more at the husk of broken metal she could vaguely remember a funny little glob floating in what had once been a tube of growth fluid, she thought she recalled the "good doctor" saying its name was Cell. 

Suddenly her head snapped up, she felt a strong ki rising, and quickly. She let a slow, sadistic smile creep across her perfect featured face. _So, the little boy is back._ Slowly she stood, the mess on the floor forgotten. _Perhaps he wants to play. _"Juunana-gou!" her cold voice snapped Juunana-gou's attention away from his "work". 

Looking down at Bulma he smirked. If his sister ever found out he'd messed with the hostage, (and she surely would) he was in trouble. Juu would likely yell at him for going against the plan they had come up with a few weeks ago. The twins had a lot of fun in the past month or so they had been alive. Killing off the humans was always a good way to let out your frustrations. And boy did they have a lot of pent up frustration. 

Quickly he dressed himself, leaving Bulma curled up in a fetal position on the floor. "What?!" he whined childishly at Juuhachi-gou who was tapping her foot impatiently in the doorway of the old lab and glaring at her twin. Juuana-gou noticed, with slight amusement that her eyebrow was twitching just like Vegeta's used to before they killed him. 

"Don't think I don't know what you were doing. Didn't I tell you not to do that?" her voice had a ring of actual emotion in it. 

"Aw come off it Juu! This is a perfect way to get back at him! He won't like the fact he couldn't protect her because he was in the past at the time." he ran a hand through his slightly messy hair as he joined his twin in the next room. _That bitch sure put up quite a fight for a human._

"Argh! You're hopeless!" she threw her hands up, "Any ways, that's not the point!" 

"Ahh, so that's why you're making such a big deal out of it." he frowned at his sister, she acted so human at times it wasn't even funny. 

"I'm not making a big deal out of it." she said defensively. _He can be so childish at times!_

Juunana-gou didn't say anything._ I wish she would get to the point!_

Juuhachi smirked, in her book a silent Juunana-gou meant another battle won, "He's back." she said simply, crossing her arms, making an unconscious imitation of Vegeta. 

"Trunks is back?" his frown was instantly replaced by a half smile. "I bet he's not happy." the smile slowly grew into a cruel smile.. 

"Let's go welcome him home shall we?" Juuhachi leaned her head into the next room where Bulma was still laying curled up on the floor, "What do you think Bulma-chan?" she used the chan because she knew it would royally piss off the human woman. 

Bulma threw her best glare at the female jinzounigen and let out a steady stream of curses at Juunana-gou, who had joined his sister in the doorway. When Juunana-gou walked towards her she scrambled to her feet and ran to the other end of the darkened room which unfortunately for her had no door. "Chikusho!" she screamed when he wordlessly threw her over his shoulder. 

Juuhachi would have laughed at the scene if she hadn't been so wrapped up in the return of the saiyan hybrid. They wordlessly went outside and took off in the direction that Trunks Ki was headed in. The place he had defeated them last time. Juuhachi-gou allowed herself a real smile, _He's no stronger than the last time we saw him._ Little did he know that they had a "little" surprise for him when he got there. The twins didn't even look back when another jinzouningen joined up with them. Juuroku-gou had been looking at flowers again. 

* * *

The twins got there ahead of Trunks and took a comfortable seat on a half demolished wall of a building. Juunana-gou tossed Bulma to the ground and kept an eye on her incase she decided to run. 

"You're going to be sorry you ever came back to life! My son will blast you to hell and back!" screamed Bulma, getting to her feet, ignoring her nakedness, and whirling to face the twins and Juurokugou. 

"Not likely." sneered Juunana-gou, he knew, but would not admit, that Juuroku-gou was stronger then either himself or Juuhachi-gou, and they had reprogrammed the giant jinzounigen to kill Trunks. Seeing as Son Goku was already dead. 

Juuroku-gou hadn't resisted, his programming only allowed him to react to Son Goku. 

"Oh I think its very likely." spat Bulma, "He killed you once, he can kill you again. If he can kill you two I'm sure he can kill that," she jabbed a finger at Juuroku-gou, "with no problem." 

The twins smiled secretively and then looked up as they felt Trunks Ki coming closer. Smirks covering both their faces, the twins jumped off the wall and watched as a bright white light began to grow larger as it neared. "Come little warrior, show us your true power. As pathetic as it may be." muttered Juuhachi-gou as she stared at the aura, which prevented one from seeing whoever was emitting it. 

Having a flash of insight, Juunana-gou grabbed Bulma from behind and held her against him. _This is the perfect way to hurt that little brat. Kill his mother right in front of him when he can't do a thing about it._ Needless to say he was a little bent on revenge. 

Juuana-gou had one of Bulma's arms twisted behind her, his other arm was bent around her neck, making it hell for her to move. He relished it as she screamed bloody murder. She even tried to slip out of his hold but only managed to hurt herself more. 

He roughly pulled Bulma with him to flank Juuroku-gou's left side while Juuahachi-gou flanked his right. "Hmm Bulma-chan, it seems as though the son you so worriedly were going to "save" by going back to the past has returned, only to come to **_your_** rescue." he purred in her ear. 

Bulma hissed and moved to slap him, nearly dislocating her arm as she pulled it against Juuana-gou's firm grip. "Don't you dare call me "chan" you baka yarou!" 

"Now, now Bulma dear, lets watch our language. We wouldn't want the little tyke to pick up any bad habits now would we?" he chuckled as he referred to Trunks as a tyke. The kid had been fighting them since he was old enough to fire a Ki blast. 

"Chikusho!" she muttered, as she watched her son draw nearer to where she unwillingly stood with the jinzounigen. 

"Anato mo. You to." Juunana-gou chuckled when her face went red, he could tell she was about to blow up at him. 

However, her detonation was postponed as Trunks touched down in front of the twins. His face twisted in a combination of fear, hate, and determination. A deadly combination of feelings in a saiyan. More so for the saiyans opponent. 

"Hand over my mother." Trunks said in a voice which was entirely too calm. 

Juuhachi-gou smirked, "As you wish." 

Juunana-gou flexed his wrist and laughed as Bulma screamed, "Sure boy. We'll hand her over. I'm not promising she'll be in one piece though." he laughed again as he put pressure on Bulma's now broken arm. 

Bulma was nearly blinded by the pain, she stared through a gray haze at her son, "Trunks." she whimpered. 

"Bastard!" screamed Trunks as a blinding golden light erupted from his body and a tear rolled down his cheek. No one. NO ONE, Hurt his mother and got away with it. He would kill that jinzounigen slowly now. No doubt about it, Juunana-gou would pay. The problem was, that to get to Juuana-gou he would have to go through his mother. 

"I may be and I may not be. I don't really remember." answered Juunana-gou with a grin. He was referring to the fact that he and his sister remembered nothing of their lives before they became jinzounigen. "Your mother may have it right though." he paused to rub his head against Bulma's cheek for a moment. 

Bulma whimpered at his touch and then scowled at the jinzounigen holding her hostage, "Chikusho!" she yelled with a hint of hysteria in her voice. 

"She keeps calling me a chikusho, a beast, and I can't help to think that she was right." he smirked and shifted his hand with which he had been holding Bulma's arm behind her back to the top of her head. Bulma growled at him, he smiled at the womans bravery, "Emphasis on the was." And broke her neck. 

Trunks felt part of his sanity go flying out the window, as well as his warriors self control and discipline. None of it mattered now. All he could do now was kill. Kill the worthless obscenities that had murdered his mother. The only one he had had left in the world. Now she was dead and gone. Just like the rest of them. Vegeta, his father, Gohan, his mentor and best friend, Krillen, Yamcha, Piccolo, and so many more. All killed by one of the owners of the two sets of hands he saw before him now. Juuhachi-gou, and Juunana-gou. 

Screaming with rage, Trunks shot forward, reaching a level of power that Kami himself didn't know he had within him, and knew no more. 

* * *

Trunks woke up a while later with his back against the last few feet of a wall he had blown apart during his fight with the jinzouningen. Still groggy and weak from the battle, it took Trunks a few moments to realize that he was clutching something in his arms. Much like a child would cling to a teddy bear, Trunks was holding his mothers cold body like it was a precious gift that he had never appreciated until it was gone. 

For a while he just sat there, hugging the lifeless body of his mother close to him. He cried, not loud sobbing or bawling, just crying like a little kid. The tears streamed down his face and he didn't care who saw them. 

Then it hit him, something he had failed to notice when he'd gotten out of the time machine, there **_were_** no other ki's **_anywhere_**. Then he realized what had happened. 

_Damnit. Those jinzounigen won. They're dead for good now but they still won._ After all his years of training. All his hard work. He had been beaten. 

Releasing his mothers body long enough to check himself over for wounds, Trunks scowled at an ugly gash one of the cyborgs had managed to give him. It was scythe shaped, and was still pouring blood. _I can't have been out that long or I would have bled to death. I'd better find something to stop the bleeding, mom wouldn't want me to die from a stupid cut._

Glancing around for anything he could use as a make-shift bandage, Trunks could only see one thing. 

Juunana-gous' bandana. 

_No WAY am I useing THAT!_

Bowing his head in defeat, Trunks picked up his mothers body and headed for Capsule Corp., treading past three piles of blackened ash on his way. 

_Trunks!>_

Trunks' head snapped up. 

_Trunks!>_

His mothers voice. 

_Just use the damn bandana, it won't kill you.>_

The voice seemed etherreal. As if it had been carried on the wind, through time and space, just to reach him. He strained his ears, hoping to hear more. 

Hearing nothing, he shook his head, telling himself he was just hearing things, and took half a step before a sharper, more authoritive tone shocked him to the core. 

_TRUNKS!!> _The voice roared, unlike the first, this one he had never heard. 

Never heard in this demension. 

"Tousama?" his voice was loud, yet it was a mere whisper in the emptyness of the world. 

The voice, like the first, had gone. 

Deciding not to tempt fate, Trunks once again set down his mothers body. Striding - as well as he could with his injuries - over to the fallen bandana, Trunks picked it up and tied it around his arm, using his teeth as an extra hand. 

_There. Are you happy now?_ As soon as the thoughts were out he cringed. **_Someone_** up there was **_not_** very happy with him at the moment. 

Lifting his mothers dead weight again, Trunks lifted off and headed toward home. The absense of voices leaving him with a heavy burden, and a heavy heart. 

As he flew, the same thoughts ran through his head over and over again. _They won... Every human on the planet is dead... I can't stay here any longer._ His last thought rang out in his mind and he made his decision. He would go back to the past. He would not stay in Capsule Corp., not one night would he stay there alone. 

Trunks laid his mothers body on his bed and left Capsule Corp. in a flash of Ki. Flying to the nearest funeral home he grabbed a coffin that was big enough to hold his mothers tall frame, he didn't bother trying to pay for it, and flew home carrying it under his arm. 

Setting it outside Capsule Corp., Trunks slowly walked back inside to his room. Softly, he touched his mothers face, hoping that even though she had a broken neck that she might, somehow, still be alive. Her skin was stone cold, it had lost its lively luster, and she looked almost twice as small as she had in life. His gaze traveled to her face again and for the first time he noticed that her eyes were no longer a bright ocean blue. They had gone flat and gray. Trunks knew then, instinctivly, that this was the death pallar. 

Even worse than the fact she was dead, was the fact that there were no dragon balls to wish her back with. For if there had still been dragon balls she could have been wished back, she had never died before. 

Letting more tears slide down his face he dressed her in some of her nicer things, picked her up, and carried her outside to the coffin he had taken. Placing her gently in the satin lined box, he said a prayer, and closed the lid. 

He let his gaze run over the various headstones on this side of Capsule Corp., all the Z shensi and their wives were buried here. Quickly reading the names he felt a new wave of sadness. Chichi, had passed away a year or so ago. While he'd been in the past. He felt a single tear roll down his cheek. 

As the tear fell to the ground, Trunks felt something like severe dissapointment surge through his gut. Like someone had scolded him in a harsh voice. The feeling lasted for more than a minute, as if someone were trying to scold him and was unable to do it. 

And then, just as suddenly as it had come, it was gone. 

Not having a shovel, and wanting to get over with his mothers burial as soon as possible, Trunks blasted a hole in the ground next to his fathers grave. _Well Kaasan, at least you're with Tousan now._ Lowering the coffin into the ground, Trunks sniffed and then scolded himself for doing so._ I won't cry. Neither Tousan or Kaasan would want me to cry._ Shoving the dirt over his mothers coffin with his bare hands, Trunks held back the raging flood of tears. 

Still trying to hold back his tears, Trunks slowly made his way to the time machine. Sitting down in the seat he had left only half a day or so before he typed in the date he wanted to go back to and sat back, waiting for the machine to take off for the time where his wounds could start healing. Trunks intended to go back to about a month or so after Cell had been defeated. 

He noticed, five seconds to late, that the flashing date on the screen wasn't 20 years in the past. Trunks couldn't believe it. His hand had been perfectly steady when he'd put the date in, he couldn't have hit the wrong buttons. He just **_couldn't_** have. 

He was going to the pasts future. Thirty-two years **_later_** than he had wanted to go. "Kami-sama I hope everything's okay there." (he had been there for only a few hours and didn't know if he was going back to the exact date he had the last time.) he didn't think he could stand another fight, more death, more pain. _I'll kill myself if I have to see another person I care about die._ It was back to the past for him. And back to being called Mirai Trunks. 

* * *

Trunks sighed as he watched Pan spin in a tornado kick, cuffing her Uncle Goten on the chin as she did so. Pan's long black hair swirled around her body as she spun to avoid a Ki blast.   
He had begun to feel strange for some reason, like he was in two places at once. Wrinkling his brow, Trunks tried to get rid of the headache he knew he was begining to get by rubbing his temples. He was rudely jolted out of his thoughts when suddenly he found himself on the ground with Pan laying on top of him. His face flushed a bit when he realized her face was only about an inch or so away from his own. The Ki blast Pan had dodged earlier flew over them, missing their heads by a few inches, Pan shoved herself off of him as soon as the danger had passed. 

"Baka." she snapped, crossing her arms and tossing her hair over her shoulder with a flick of her head, "That could have killed you Trunks. You weren't powered up anywhere near high enough to survive it if it hit you." 

He smirked, also crossing his arms just to annoy her, "Why didn't you just yell at me?" 

Pan rolled her eyes, "I did yell at you. You were on Mars for all I knew. I should have just let the blast hit you. Might have knocked some brain cells back in." she cracked her neck before looking back up at him. She was standing too close and had to look up at a weird angle to look her friend in the eye. 

Trunks snorted at her comment about being stupid, _Me dumb? I'm not related to Goku._ knowing that that wouldn't be a particularly good comment to make to Pan he pretended he hadn't heard her last comment and repeated what he'd said earlier. "It wouldn't have killed me." 

Just then Goten came jogging over, "What wouldn't have killed you?"he asked tiredly, stopping by his best friend and leaning on his shoulder, "Water..." he groaned. 

Laughing at her not-to-bright-but-lovable uncle, Pan lightly socked him in the arm, "The blast dummy. What else would have been able to kill a siayan?" 

Lifting an eyebrow, Trunks managed to keep from grinning, "There is your weight." he skittered out of reach before Pan could hit him. 

"Trunks!" Goten's support was gone and he fell in a heap between the two squabling saiyans. 

Blinking, Trunks looked at his friends body laying prone on the grass, "Sorry Goten." he sweat dropped and put a hand behind his head. 

Pan stepped over her uncle, still trying to resume the earlier argumant. Mainly for one reason. She just loved to fight. "Be happy you're not looking at King Yama's face right now." she poked him in the chest, hard enough to force him to take a step backwards. 

"Yeah, okay." he acted like he was giving in and walked by her to go help Goten up. When he was beside her he reached out and snatched her bandana right off her head, "Just be happy I'm not gonna rip this into teeny tiny pieces." 

Whirling with eyes wide, Pan made a wild grab for her bandana, "Give that back!" Trunks swiftly got out of her reach, making Pan lose her balence and trip on Goten. 

Laughing at the sight of Pan with her face pressed into the ground, Trunks waggled the fingers of his free hand at her, "Come and get it." bunching it up in his hand so that she couldn't just grab it from him he darted back a few yards, just incase she got up and decided to rush at him. "Heeeeeeere Panny-channy." he called, teasingly waving the orange piece of cloth at her. 

"Trunks!!" she growled and leapt at him only to almost fall flat on her face again when he disappeared from where he was supposed to be. Levitating above the ground she glanced around the area hoping to see where the purple haired perpetrator had gone to. Only seeing her uncle still laying sprawled on the ground with swirls in his eyes, she growled and tried to find Trunks' Ki. She snorted when she couldn't find it. "Damnit. Now my hairs all messed up and I don't have my bandana to cover it with." 

* * *

Trunks chuckled as he saw Pan try to fix her mussed hair and fly off in the opposite direction he'd gone in. She'd never find him now. Although he couldn't exactly go throw a party at the moment, she was still close enough to hear him if he made too much noise, in an attempt not to laugh he took a deep breath. 

Something smelled like strawberries. 

Looking at the bandana he held in his hand he unconsciously sniffed it. The scent matched the one he'd just gotten a whiff of. The strawberry smell, he asumned, was Pan's shampoo, the bandana still carried the faint scent of Pan's ex boyfriend, whom Pan had broken up with a few weeks ago. The memory of Tom made him scowl, he had never liked that guy. Not since the first moment he'd laid eyes on him. 

*** 

Trunks hummed to himself as he walked up the drive to Pan's house. They were supossed to go to a movie later that day with Marron, Goten, and Bra. Pan had asked if she could bring a friend. 

He opened the door and let himself in as he was used to doing and froze in the door way. There was a guy sitting on the couch. A relatively good looking guy. Wearing baggy jeans and a loose t-shirt. 

"Who are you?" Trunks asked the guy, who had long legs stretched out and propped up on the coffee table. 

The guy turned a cocky smile on him, "I'm Tom. Who are you and what makes you think you can just waltz into a house uninvited? Panny-chan told me she's an only child." 

Trunks narrowed his eyes at Tom, "I'm Trunks Briefs and I'm Pan-chan's friend. I don't need an invitation. Why are you here?" he said. letting an icy undertone enter his voice. He already disliked this guy. Before he could burn a hole into Tom with his glare Pan walked into the room, she was wearing a red cropped tank top and a pair of loose fitting faded jeans. 

"Heylo Trunks, I see you've met Tom. He's my new boyfriend." her words made Trunks feel as if he had just swallowed a cup of liquid fire. _Boyfriend? She's too young to have a boyfriend. Wait a minute, she wanted to bring a friend. This guys her FRIEND? Let alone her BOYFRIEND? I don't think so!_

In that instant Trunks decided to make sure that Tom would be out of the picture. He didn't deserve Pan. Pan was too sweet of a girl to be wasted on a loser like this. _Tom will never want to see Pan again after today. Now all I need is an excuse to get her out of the room for a few minutes._

The phone rang upstairs in Pan's bedroom and she excused herself to go and answer it. A faint, moshi moshi could be heard from where the boys sat in the living room. It sounded as if it we're one of Pan's girlfriends from school. It was bound to be a long phone call. 

_Bingo._

Instantly Trunks dropped his fake smile and glowered at Tom. 

"What's your problem?" Tom sneered from his spot on the couch. He was obviously not impressed about Trunks' being the president of Capsule Corp. and he could see that Trunks was a little peeved of the fact he was going out with Pan. 

"You." Trunks' eyes were narrowed, slamming his fist into his palm, Trunks looked ready to kill. 

However this did not frighten Tom at all. The boy obviously wasn't very bright. "Ah, I see. You like her don't you?" Tom's voice dripped with sarcasm as he slowley got up off the couch and padded over to where the older man stood. 

Shaking his head Trunks was no doubt telling the truth. "Yes I like her, I love her, but not in the way you're thinking. I've known Pan since she was born, and let me tell you now you don't deserve her." he had folded his arms and looked very much like his father in a very, very, nasty mood. 

Tom snorted, "And you do right?" he rolled his eyes and suddenly found himself high in the air, held by the front of his shirt. "What the hell?" 

"I've already told you." his eyes flashed blue green for an instant, "Pan is my friend and I can tell that you'll only hurt her." Trunks' mouth twisted into a sadistic smile as he thought of another possibility, "Or she'll hurt you." (accidentaly of course) Trunks continued with a smirk on his face, "You see, we're different, we're not like humans." 

"So what are you?" scoffed Tom, "Aliens?" 

Trunks went super saiyan long enough for Tom to see that Trunks wasn't kidding and that he'd better get the hell out of there. Fast. 

Trunks set Tom down on his feet, extended a hand, flicked him on the shoulder, and watched with a smirk as the younger man fell down, scrambled to his feet, and reached the door in what must have been record time. 

_Mission accomplished._

Pan came down the stairs a moment later with a huge smile on her face. The smile shrunk a bit when she saw that Tom was leaving. "Where're you going Tom-chan? You were supposed to go with us to the movie tonight." 

Tom turned and flashed her a dazzeling smile. One he had obviously reserved only for the female species. "Uhhh I'm sorry Pan but..." he looked like he wanted to stay and explain but a look at Trunks' face (who was convieniently facing away from Pan) told him he had better get the hell out of there. "Ican'tseeyouanymorebecauseIdon'treallylikeyou." he was half way down the driveway in a space of two seconds and never looked back. 

Looking at Trunks for an explaination she blinked and didn't look nearly as sad as she should have. 

Trunks shrugged, "I don't know why he left. He just said not to call him, and that he doesn't want to see you again." he let a bit of anger show in his voice so Pan didn't get suspicious about why Tom had really left. 

A veil of anger passed over Pans face and it made her dark eyes flash with sparks, Tom must've just asked her out earlier that day or she might've cried, "He did, did he? Well that's just fine with me. If he doesn't want to see me, then I don't want to see him." _I supose he just asked me out on a dare. _Pan added silently. Sighing she looked at Pan with fake exasperation, "Although it is SO hard to get a date when all the guys are scared of you." 

She had always had problems getting guys to like her. They were all scared of her power, not to mention that she had beaten up most of them on the playground daily when they were younger. She growled at herself for even accepting an invitation from that jerk and hugged Trunks' waist quickly like she would her father or Goten. "At least I've got you and the gang." 

Patting her shoulder comfortingly Trunks smiled gently, "You'll find someone someday Panny."   


* * *

"Argh! Stupid console!" Mirai Trunks had landed the Hope in an old abandoned junk yard and was trying to fix it, the problem was, somehow the the controls had gotten screwed up the circuits were fried . The time machine would probably never work again. _Kuso! I'm stuck thirty-two years in the pasts future. I think it would be appropriate to say that this sucks._ He yelled at himself as he tried once again to repair the damaged Hope and raised an arm protectively over his face when the console exploded. _Damnit_. 

"At least this world isn't in shambles." Mirai Trunks looked around at the world he had left a few hours before. It was the same one, he was sure, that he had been able to save, only everything was older. _At least I saved SOMETHING. _He thought bitterly to himself. 

He shot a harsh look at the broken remains of the Hope. _Well, guess I really AM stuck here._

Out of the corner of his eye he saw something that made his blood boil. Grabbing his sword from its sheath and angrily slashed out the word Hope!! on the side of the time machine. After he was sure he had scraped off all reminants of the word Mirai Trunks put his sword back none to gently giving the time machine a kick as he did so. 

He froze when he felt a powerful Ki coming his way, he didn't recognize it. Swinging his head in the direction it was coming from he concentrated while he tried to come up with a mental image. The person was definetly female._ So powerful. she can't be a normal human._ _A new Z fighter? Or a new threat? _Not sure if the newcomer would be friend or foe, he drew his sword again and darted behind a junk pile to observe the person without being observed himself. 

Pan smirked as she penpointed Trunks' ki in the old junk yard. He had used to bring her there when he babysat her so they could play hide and seek. (at her insistance) _Ha! What a stupid place to hide. I know every nook and cranny of that place! You can't hide from me._

Stopping about fifty or so feet in the air, Pan scanned the junk yard floor before calling out to Trunks, "I know you're in there! Come out before I have to hurt you!" 

Generally this was a stupid thing to say to Mirai Trunks because he now asoumned she was an enemy. Shifting into a stance that would let him fly out in any direction, he got a good grip on his sword, and waited. Getting a good look at Pan's face he finally recognized her from his last visit to the past, he knew this girl was one of the good guys, he had seen her talking with this times Trunks-- actually he had unwillingly eavesdropped while hiding in a big lilac bush. 

Mirai Trunks hadn't seen anything even close to being an enemy and by scanning through the different ki signatures he had known that with Goku gone Vegeta was the strongest being on the planet. Mirai Trunks was absolutly cirtain his father could handle anything that came his way. Asurred he wouldn't need to make any guest appearanes even if an enemy had shown up Mirai Trunks had decided to return home as fast as possible. 

Mirai Trunks' main prioraty had been keeping tabs on the jinzouningen, and he had deliberalty hid his ki and avoided the Z shensi, he didn't want to tempt himself by seeing them. He had missed them so much already in the space of a few monthes, he didn't think he'd be able to go home if he allowed himself to speak with them. 

Even though he now knew that Pan was no threat, Mirai Trunks kept hidden. The first person he would reveal himself to would be his mother. This wan't like his last trip to the past, everyone knew who he was this time. How was he going to explain having long hair when on his last visit here his other self had short hair? 

Letting out an exasperated sigh, Pan ran a hand through her thick, but fine to the touch hair, "Okay fine Trunks. If you won't come to me, then I'll come to you." letting gravity pull her to Earth, Pan folded her arms and tried to ignore the tickly feeling of her hair billowing up in her face. 

Mirai Trunks stared, the girl was pretty, yes, she was indeed beautiful. Beautiful but potentiolly dangerous if she told everyone about his being here without his seeing his moth- Bulma, first. Searching her ki, he assured himself she would be no match for him if she did turn out to be trouble. She was much weaker than he. 

Pulling off her fighting gloves and shoving them in her pocket so that they didn't stick to her skin in the late afternoon heat, Pan let out a loud huff of breath, "Trunks, come ON! It's almost dinner time and if we don't get back to your house then Goten's gonna get all the food!" she looked around a scrap pile for Trunks. 

Nothing. 

She had expected the mention of food would bring him running faster than her grandfather could teleport. 

"Trunks, this isn't funny, you're thirty-two years old and still play hide and seek?" she clicked her tounge as she kicked at the bottom of a scrap pile, a few peices of sheet metal slid down and crashed over to her left. "That's just sad. The last time we played this I was 10." 

Mirai Trunks relaxed, he couldn't see her anymore, she had wandered around a scrap pile as she looked for him. She didn't sound like an enemy anymore. In fact, she sounded as if this world version of himself and her were friends. He was just about to make himself scarce and beat it to capsule corp. when a shadow fell over him. 

He glanced at the silouhette of the person. Short, female, and standing in an offensive stance. _Jinzouningen!_

"I'd like my bandana back now." Pan tugged on the orange piece of cloth tied onto his arm as she spoke, not looking up at his face.She knew what her friend looked like, why bother looking at him? 

Her tugging on the bandana had opened the wound again causing pain. Pain which triggered well tuned survival instincts. So used to living in constant fear of the cyborgs was he, that he instantly whirled and knocked her unconcious. 

Pan dropped quickly to the ground, landing with a dull thud. Managing a short groan, her head rolled to the side and her eyelids quivered, as if she were fighting as hard as she could not to give into the blackness that was trying to swallow her. 

Realizing that they had both mistaken each other for who they weren't, Mirai Trunks knelt down and put two fingers to her neck. Her pulse, strong and healthy, pumped normally in the vein in her throat. _She'll be fine in a little while. _Picking up her limp form and straightening to his full height, Trunks looked at her for a minute. 

Pan had a lot of hair and without her bandana it was always falling in her face, her bangs were sticking to her forehead from her recent spar with her uncle. Brushing a few stray strands out of the way he watched the way the setting sun was picking out the bluish hints in her hair. 

Pushing thoughts of his passenger to the back of his mind Mirai Trunks slowly rose into the air and continued his slow pace all the way to Capsule Corp. He needed the time to think. 

_I know this worlds Bulma will let me stay. I just hope I won't be in the way. _He grimaced as he flew, _I hope there're no apocalyptic monsters in this world. _The same thoughts ran through his head the whole way, but each time they did he treated them like he'd just thought of them, and chewed over them again. 

Intentionally avoiding the gravity room and yard, where he had leaned that his father usually dwelled, Mirai Trunks popped his window open with ease using a trick he had learned when he was very young. Once inside, he deposited Pan on his bed, closed the door and went to find Bulma. 

Treading quietly down the hallway, avoiding ki sigantures he didn't know and blasting the servo bots, he found his mother exactly where he knew she would be. In her lab. 

"Okaasan?" he said softly as he entered the lab. A lab so much like the one his mother had spent countless hours in inventing things and trying to save everyone in her own way... _And she enjoyed it too. It made her feel as if she was doing something worthwhile. Like she was helping._

"Yes Trunks-chan?" she hadn't even turned around, assuming this was her present time son. "Could you pass me the inter dimensional stabilizing thingamajig?" 

Mirai Trunks stared at the gadgets and parts spread out all over Bulma's work desk, _What the heck? A inter-somthing thingy?_ He was a warrior, not a mechanic. "A what?" his face held a look of absolute alienity. 

Bulma turned to point out what she'd wanted, wondering why he hadn't sounded as if he had a clue what it was. He helped her out in the lab twice a week, for heavens sake, and he was the President of Capsule Corp. now, Bulma had retired a few years ago. It was his job to know these things. An instant after he had handed her what she'd wanted she caught a glimpse of his hair out of the corner of her eye. His **_long_** hair. Whirling around she stared at him. At her son, who wasn't her son at the same time. "Mirai Trunks?!" she had a look of shocked disbelief on her young face, she didn't even look 50, let alone 60, which was how old she was supossed to be. Marai Trunks was slightly saddened, his mother had shown her age, he supossed it may have been because of the constant stress of living a nightmare.. 

"Hai Kaasan," he inclined his head a bit and averted his eyes, it was painful to look at her, "It's me." he shifted his weight nervously and scuffed the toe of his boot on the tile floor of the lab. 

Bulma was extatic, holding his face in her hands and forcing him to look at her, "But why are you here? You don't look a day older then the last time I saw you! Thirty years ago!" she was griping his shoulders now and giving him a searching look, "What happened?" she knew he wouldn't have come back unless something serious had happened. He had sworn to protect his world, and would do so at any cost. 

Mirai Trunks lost it then, his body trembled and he cried out his story to his alternate mother. "I went back, and the jinzouningen were alive again." he paused to glower at an imaginary Juunana-gou mocking him while he sat on the work table. He grunted when his mother made him sit on the floor and wrapped her arms around him in a hug. He looked like he needed one, and badly. 

"I'm listening Trunks-chan," she left off the "Mirai" because she wanted to treat him like her own son, which in a way he was. "Tell me everything."   


* * *

"I left the time machine back in the junk yard. It couldn't be repaired by a team of the best scientists in the world anyway. The girl seemed just fine and I knew she'd wake up in a few minutes seeing as how strong she was." he took a breath, "So I put her in my room. I didn't know what else to do with her." 

Bulma stroked her alternate sons long hair as she thought about everything he'd said. "Oh honey I'm so sorry." she kissed the top of his head, trying to think of something less morbid to ask him about. "What did the girl look like?" she asked, wanting to know whose parents she'd have to explain a possible bump to. There was only a few women she could think of that would be able to fly. Pan of course, and then there was Bra, she had only just a few months ago learned to fly, she still had no interest for fighting though. Mirai Trunks had said that the girl had had a large power level, since Bra was Vegeta's daughter, she could have a high power level, although it would be higher if she trained. Then there was Marron, who had the potentiol to be able to fly, although she hadn't learned how yet. She, like Bra, had no interest in learning to fight. 

Mirai Trunks thought back to the girl he had lain on his bed a while ago. "She was kind of short, long black hair, slim, and she was wearing a pair of baggy jeans, hiking boots and a white shirt with a sleevless jacket over it. Now that i think about it her ki felt kind of like Gohans'. I didn't recognize it because I haven't seen him since-" he answered slowly. 

Bulma clicked her tounge, and cut him off, he could have just told her what the girl was wearing and she could have figured it out. All three girls had extremly different tastes in clothes. "That was Pan. The reason she felt like Gohan was because she's his-" 

Now Marai Trunks cut her off, "Little sister right?" she had to be. She was more then powerful enough, the only other way she could be this powerful was... _No way!_ Marai Trunks realized it before his mother could shake her head. 

Bulma bit back a laugh and smiled a bit at her alternate son's obvious surprise to who Pan's father was, "No, she's his daughter, she's eighteen." 

Mirai Trunks had half hoped he'd been wrong but his mother had confirmed it. "Daughter?" he choked on the word, "Gohan has a kid? Oh kami! I hit her! What's Gohan gonna say?" he stood up running his fingers through his long hair and hoped that his alternate best friend wouldn't be to mad. 

"More importantly," Bulma stood up so she could be at eye level with her son, "What's Trunks gonna say when he finds her in his bedroom?" 

Slapping a hand over his face, Marai Trunks groaned, "Kuso!" _If she wakes up and my alternate self is there then she might attack him thinking **he's** the one who hit **her**!_

Suddenly a sound loud enough to burst even a deaf person ear drums shook the house. 

* * *

"AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH! Get away from me you hentai!!!!!!" shrieked a very confused Pan when she saw Trunks leaning over her. Leaping up she saw that she was in his bedroom. 

"What? I'm not a hentai! I was just going to see if you were awake and ask why the hell you were sleeping on MY bed in MY ROOM!!" Trunks yelled back. ( can we say brother sister spat? ) 

Pan stopped screaming long enough to hiss through her teeth at Trunks, "WHY, then did you HIT me and knock me out cold???!" 

"What? I never did that! I was still hiding from you when I felt a huge ki go up! You were close to it and then your ki dropped to almost zero. I was worried and I wanted to find out what happened so I came here and I found you asleep in my room! I do NOT think that qualifies me as a pervert!" he stopped yelling and spoke in a softer voice; you know, the one where the guy knows if he doesn't act nice then he's gonna be in hot water. "I'd never hurt you. You should know that by now." 

Her eyes flashed blue green, she thought he was calling her weak. Pan had achieved super saiyan a year after they had returned from finding the black star dragon balls in outer space. She had been sparring with Trunks when it had happened, he had made her mad on purpose, he'd known that if she got mad enough she would probably go super saiyan. His plan had played out brilliantly, but Pan had given him a work over for everything he'd said and was still a bit sensitive about it. 

"Oh so I'm WEAK?! Well come on Mr. President lets go!" she slipped into a stance and unconsiously lifted a hand to her forhead where a nasty bruise was swelling. The pain of touching it only made her even madder. "And if you didn't give me this then who did?" she pointed to her bruise and then charged at Trunks. 

It was either get pulverized or fight back for Trunks, not wanting to be covered with bruises for a meeting he had scedualed tomorrow, Trunks fought back. Powering up, Trunks went super saiyan at the same time Pan did. They exchanged a few blows but in the limited space in the bedroom it was hard to move around. 

Suddenly the door to Trunks room banged open and Bulma stood there, fisted hands on hips. She looked VERY authoritive. "What is going on in here?" 

A voice from behind her said in a quiet voice, "I did." neither Pan nor Trunks appeared to have heard it. 

Bulma's yelling was enough to get both saiyans to power down 

"Uh... Just sparring kaasan." Trunks lied. 

"Thats what the gravity room is for young man!" 

There was a chuckle from behind Bulma. Both teens head shot up. "Who's out there?" asked Trunks, taking a step forward. 

The shadowed stranger stood out in the hallway, Pan, always curious, tried hard to get a better look. Failing because the light wasn't on in the hall, she ducked under Bulma's arm and caught the stranger by the arm. "Hey, who are you?" she said as she flicked on the lights. 

Mirai Trunks eyes were wide, his cover had been prematurly blown, he raised a hand weakly, "Hello." he offered the short greeting and looked at Bulma as if to say, "Well? What now?" 

Pan was speachless. Her mouth moved but no sound came out. Frustrated to not be able to say anything, Pan ran a hand through her hair and finally found her voice, "Trunks?" 

Trunks peeked over his mothers shoulder, not expecting anyone but Pan to be out there he came within inches of his alternate selfs face. "Oh my..." his eyes widened as he faced off with... himself with shoulder length hair. "It's me?" his confusion added to Pans and pretty soon both of them just stood there and stared at Mirai Trunks like two fish out of water, mouths open and eyes wide. 

"Trunks, Pan, I believe I have some explaining to do. Trunks, go get your father, Pan could you call your parents and Chichi and get them to come over here? I believe they'll want to know about this too." she ushered the gawking man and young woman out of the room and took Mirai Trunks by the arm, leading him to the living room she sighed, "This is gonna be a long night." 

Mirai Trunks nodded and stared down the hall in the direction Pan had gone. "At least she's not mad." 

"I think she's too shocked to be mad." giggled Bulma.   


* * *

Indeed it **_was_** a long night. Once Chichi, Videl, and Gohan were at Capsule Corp. they insisted she call the rest of the gang before she told them exactly who this young man was and, for those who knew who he was already, why he had returned. As soon as everyone invited was present, Bulma retold Mirai Trunks' long sad tale, she hadn't wanted to make her alternate son go through anymore pain than he already had gone through that day by making him retell it. 

Pan watched her friends alternate self sit through the whole thing, acting as though he were reliving every word of the story, and felt a tear in the corner of her eye. _What a sad life he must have lived. And to not be able to do a thing about it. It must have been awful._

Looking around at all the people who were about the same age as his mother Trunks sighed, he was a bit irritated at the fact that it seemed they all knew most of the story up until when his alternate self had returned to his own time. He felt sorry for his alternate self, having fought in several battles himself he knew what it was like to feel no hope. But he had never been alone in his battles, not like Mirai Trunks, to have no hope, and to have no help as well, it must have been hell. 

Trunks was also ticked because Marron had almost cried when Bulma had told how the Mirai jinzouningen had killed everyone and left Mirai Trunks alive for sport, she couldn't believe her mother and uncle could be that cruel. Mirai Trunks had noticed, but he had seemed to think she deserved it for reasons known only to him. Juuhachi-gou had even flinched, one of her rare displays of emotion, when Bulma told everyone what their alternate selves had done. 

Most of the older Z shensi looked as if this were old news, and like they really didn't want to hear about it. Especially Krillen, because he was married to, and had a daughter with, Juuhachi. When Trunks' gaze had landed on Pan he frowned slightly. She was staring at Mirai Trunks with huge, shining, **_adoring_**, eyes. Glancing her way every few moments, Trunks noticed she was crying, Pan, like himself, could obviously understand how Mirai Trunks felt. Although she was more emotional about it. Her whole attention was focused on his alternate counterpart and Bulma's telling of the story. 

"-and he's staying with us." Bulma finished with a note of finality, as if she were saying that no one was to mention the subject ever agian. 

Marron scuffed the toe of her shoe on the rug uncomfortably, "Mirai-san?" 

Trunks' other self turned an icey glare on her, "What?" 

For the first time Marron was wearing her hair down. Over the last few years, just as she had mysteriously grown a nose, her eyes had changed shape. She could be Juuhachi's twin sister. The only real differences were that Marron had longer hair than her mother and a sweeter expression. 

Flinching slightly, Marron met his eyes even though doing so scared her, his icey expression could kill pigeons in midair, "I'm sorry." she lowered her head after apoligizing for her future parents atrocities. 

Mirai Trunks' eyes flickered a moment and he looked as if he were about to say something to make Marron feel better, but when his gaze traveled to Juuhachi-gou it was gone instantly. 

Trunks glanced at Pan again. She was still giving his future counterpart that same infatuated, "wow" expresion. Trunks pouted inwardly, _She used to look at me like that. _

* * *

  
[][1]

   [1]: http://www.geocities.com/jez_chan/ATWHch2.html



	2. Starting Now I'm Learning Fast

Journey To The Past   
Chapter Two: "Starting Now I'm Learning Fast"   
By J-chan   


* * *

  
Disclaimer: I do not own Dragon Ball Z or any of its characters. They are owned by some animation corporation that I can't spell and don't feel like looking up the name of right now. I didn't create them either, Akira Toriyama did. I do own this story however. I wrote it. Don't use it without my permission please.

*Sigh* I don't get why disclaimers are so important. No one ever actually CLAIMS to own these characters do they? *hmph*

Notes: I'm not totally sure of what happened in the Cell saga or exactly when Mirai Trunks killed the jinzounigen, I did my best to keep the time line intact. Also, some characters my be a bit out of character, but I did try to keep them acting normal. Enjoy!   


* * *

  
  


_Somewhere down this road,_   
_I know someones waiting,_   
_Years of dreams just can't be wrong._

_Arms will open wide,_   
_I'll be safe and wanted,_   
_finally home where I belong._

_Yes, starting now I'm learning fast,_   
_On this journey, to the past._   


_Captains log of the Hope; 21 days after landing: It has been a few weeks since "the incident" and it seems Trunks is adjusting well to living in the past. He has become fast friends with Pan, and he absolutly adores Gohan. He knows that this Gohan will never take the place of the one he had in our time, but he seems to try and forget about what happened to his teacher. Marron tries to make friends with him but he either ignores her or is rude. He knows she is the daughter of the reedeemed Juuhachi-gou, but he can't seem to let go of his now instinctual hate for the blonde cyborg. It doesn't help that Marron looks just like her mother. That year in the Room of Spirit and Time with his father definetly had a big affect on him. He wasn't raised this way! The past Trunks is kind of a strange case, they both seem to want to avoid each other as much as possible. As of now I have no idea why, but I will find out._

Mirai Trunks sat on the roof of Orange Star High as he waited for the bell to signal the end of the day. 

He'd never went to school. 

He'd never had to. 

The bell rang, startling Mirai Trunks out of his thoughts, the sound sent him off the edge of the roof and toward the ground. Turning his fall into a jump, Mirai Trunks landed gracfully on his feet, and turned when he felt a tap on his shoulder. 

Pan lifted an eyebrow at his unusual entrance and hefted her dropped bookbag onto her shoulder, "You shouldn't do that Tru-chan. Someone could see you." 

Mirai Trunks looked around at the empty school yard, "Like who? You're so fast you always get out here before everyone else." 

"That's not the point!" 

"Then what is?" 

Pan blinked and opened her mouth to make a sharp retort. Then let it shut like a slammed door. She never knew what to say around him. Picking up speed she jumped into the aircar that Bulma made her alternate son pick Pan and Bra up in after school. She thought it helped get his mind off of his real mother. 

Not that either girl or a cirtain guy minded. 

Seeing he'd won another round, Mirai Trunks jumped into the driver seat without bothering to open the door. "So where's Bra?" Mirai Trunks had made it a habit, instead of a chore, to pick up both girls and take them wherever they wanted to go after school. He didn't need to go to two different places either, since Orange Star High was right next to the college. 

Pan shrugged and flung her backpack in the back seat, "Bra's probably getting her books and stuff out of her locker or something." 

Soft footsteps and a not so soft voice were heard a few seconds later. "That's because I don't see the point of breaking my back carrying all of my stuff around in _that_!" Bra pointed at Pan's tattered old backpack and shook her head. "Honestly Pan, you've used that one since you went with niichan to find the black stars, isn't it about time to get a new one?" 

Stubbornly shaking her head, Pan hugged the denim pack to her chest, "Nope! This one works just fine. 'Sides, it brings back memories." 

Bra rolled her eyes, "Of what? When you put the space ships key down your shirt so Trunks couldn't get at it?" her face took on a devilish look that made her look like her mother with Vegeta's personality. "I think you had a crush on him." 

Mirai Trunks watched the fight like it was a tennis match, niether girl seemed to be backing down. Both were as stubborn as could be. However Mirai Trunks was still processing something said several sentances back. _Funny. Well mother DID always tell me I was goodlooking. At least Pan-chan's nice and cute. I'd hate to have a psyhco like me if I were.... well my other self._

After a moment more of watching Pan and Bra argue, Mirai Trunks got a surprise. 

_ACK! This is your best friends DAUGHTER we are talking about here!_

Mirai Trunks' eyes widened considerably and his jaw dropped just a little. _What the?!_

Back at Capsule Corp a second pair of eyes and mouth opened in exactly the same fashion. _What the?!_   


* * *

Trunks sighed as he stared at the computer on his desk. _Technology. Who needs it?_ Leaning back in his chair he closed his eyes and thought about what he could be doing if he weren't sitting at a desk. 

_Funny. Well mother DID always tell me I was good looking. At least Pan-chan's nice and cute. I'd hate to have a psyhco liking me if I were him._

_Where did that come from?! This is insane! Your best friends neice? Wait a minute. _It took Trunks a moment to realize what must have happened_. That thought must have come from Mirai Trunks! _Picturing his younger, alternate self in his mind, Trunks tried to send a thought. 

One that would get his otherself to think straight. 

_ACK! This is your best friends DAUGHTER we are talking about here!_

Almost immediatly he received a telepathic answer. _What the?!_

_What the?! _Trunks was shocked. He'd just been bored, he hadn't actually expected it to work! 

_I geuss since we're technicly the same person we can hear each others thoughts if we concentrate enough. _The alternate Trunks had promptly forgotten to put the brakes on and had run a red light, almost causing a three way crash in the process. 

_No kidding. _Trunks was having to actually concentrate on sending his thoughts, but his other self seemed to be doing it without trouble. 

_Listen, I'm driving here, lets just figure this out later. I have other things to pay attention to._   
Mirai Trunks glanced at the girl next to him and then fixed his gaze on the road. 

_HEY! I saw that! You stay away from Pan-chan! You're too old for her! _Trunks shot out of his chair and started opening the window to his office. 

Trunks recieved a chuckle from his copunterpart, _You, my friend, are the one thats too old for her. But that's beside the point. You are WAY over doing the protective big brother bit. _Mirai Trunks mentaly laughed, _Don't worry. She can take care of herself remember? You **are** the one who spars with her, isn't that where that nasty bruise on your shoulder came from?_

Trunks was about to reply when his alternate self severed the connection. _Damnit! At least now I know why I've been getting headaches when I'm around him! All his memories are bad ones!_   


* * *

_I hope Pan-chan is taking good care of Mirai Trunks. _Thought Videl as she glanced at Gohan - for what seemed the thousandth time in ten minutes - who was watching th clock. Someone who didn't know him would have thought him having an unhealthy obsession with the way the hands moved or perhaps the numbers on the round face; but Videl knew better. 

Gohan went back to reading his newpaper when he realized he was being watched only to lay it down the second he felt Videls eyes leave his tall and broadshouldered frame. "-better not do anything stupid." he muttered while pushing his glasses back into place. Darn things; why couldn't somebody invent a pair that didn't pinch your nose or keep sliding off? 

His wife obviously had better hearing than he had first thought. "Don't worry Gohan. You should know Mirai Trunks won't try anything with Pan." she crossed the room and playfully socked him on the shoulder, "He knows he'd have to deal with you first!" When Gohan frowned and again pushed his glasses up Videl clicked her tongue. "Really dear, Pan can take care of herself." 

Sighing and finally taking his glasses off - which he didn't really need anyway, Gohan looked as if he were going to launch into a speech about how he could worry about his little girl if he wanted to. Just before Videl could cut him off again he grinned, "What makes you think I was worried about Pan? She is your daughter after all." 

Eyes widening and then narrowing to slits Videl picked up the closest thing - which luckily for Gohan happened to be a pillow - and threw it at her husbands head. "Oh shut up."   


* * *

"So where to?" Mirai Trunks cringed in his seat, hoping that he wouldn't have to drive them to half the stores in town. Bra had a hobby of shopping and could usually get Pan to go with her. Although Bra did have self control when it came to limiting her time in the mall, once in the shopping mood, there was no stopping Pan. She could shop for hours and still somehow find the energy to train. 

"Capsule Corp. I geuss, Trunks and I are supossed to spar." Pan snapped her head around, hair flying as he revved the engine, "You can watch if you want to." 

Mirai Trunks nodded in reply and smiled a little half smile at his alternate sister and Pan. Trying to concentrate on not running into another car he pulled out of the parking lot. 

Bra fastened her seatbelt and tried hard to ignore Pan's pleading eyes. Looking at Bra through the rearveiw mirror Pan tried to look as innocent as possible, being best friends, they somehow knew what the other was going to say without them having to say it. 

"No." 

"Come on Bra! You're strong, you just need to **_learn_** how to use your powers! It's fun! You'd like it!" she put on her largest pair of puppy dog eyes and tried to look as pathetic as possible. "Please?" 

"No. Besides, I already know how to control them." 

Pan rolled her eyes, "You know how to keep your powers in check but you don't really know how to fight." she clasped her hands and whined, "Please?" 

"No!" 

"Pleasey, pleasey, pleasey?!" 

"Oh alright! But I'm not gonna stay for very long. I have homework to do." Bra would do nearly anything to get out of fighting. (even homework) She had no wish to fight, even though as a demi-saiyan she was perfectly capable of doing so. 

Resting her head on her fist, Pan could barely contain her excitment. She had just gotten her way twice in a row, with two of the most stubborn people she knew. _He said he'd watch! Maybe if he thinks I'm good enough he'll teach me to use a sword! _Sneaking a glance at him out of the corner of her eye she grinned, _Not to mention he's cute. _By now she had practicly forgotten Bra existed. 

* * *

Marron sighed as she watched Trunks and Pan circle each other, each looking to land a blow that would let them get the upperhand. Mirai Trunks was watching them from the opposite end of the yard, although he obviously saw more in the fight than Marron ever would. _It's not fair._ Her gaze traveled to the ground at her feet. _I wish Mirai-san wouldn't hate me so much. I understand why he acts as he does though, if I'd spent my life fighting someone who killed my parents I'd probably hate their kids too. _She fingered her blonde hair, _especially if they looked just like them._

Snapping her head up at a loud "oof" Marron's eyes were just sharp enough to see Trunks standing over Pan with a booted foot pressing on her lower back. Pan, although down, was definetly not out. Twisting with a supernatural flexibility, she grabbed his ankle and flung him straight into the side of Capsule Corp. 

Managing to get his feet beneath him before impact, Trunks pushed off the wall and sailed right back towards Pan. Stepping to the side, Pan avoided a punch aimed at her jaw. Landing a few meters away, Trunks took a fighters stance and faced off with Pan for the second time. 

"I don't get what's so interesting about all this." muttered Marron as she tried hard to follow every move with her human sight. She wasn't too interested in the fight, she just wished she could see what was happening without straining her eyes so much. "C'mon. You can do it." she held her breath as they locked in what would have been a deadly fistfight for a human. To the two saiyans, it was merely play. 

Spinning to get some momentum for a high kick, Pan turned her back to Trunks for a millisecond. A millisecond was all he needed to move in, slip his arms under hers and lock them behind her neck. Knowing that this was one move Pan always had trouble getting out of, he smirked. He was going to win, and they both knew it. 

Straining her muscles, Pan tried to power out of the hold. Unable to do it at her current power level, she grunted and began powering up as high and fast as she possibly could. Not fast enough though. Having anticipated her move, Trunks was just a little bit ahead of her, reaching super saiyan a few seconds before Pan, having had the upper hand for the last few moments Trunks was able to keep her in the full nelson. Straining her arms again Pan tried to get out, not able to do it she scowled and glared at Trunks out of the corner of her eye, "Kuso." 

Knowing that this was all he would get out of Pan for a submission, Trunks powered down and let go of her. Wiping some sweat off his brow he gave her a cocky grin, "I win." 

Snorting at his statement to the obvious, Pan stalked towards the kitchen, avoiding a few good sized rocks still falling to the ground as she did so. "Ornore!" she growled, quite audibly because she hadn't bothered to get out of earshot before doing so. 

Trunks looked about to follow her when his future self grabbed his arm and whispered something in his ear. Grudgingly nodding yes, Trunks followed his other self to the far end of the yard. 

Torn between going and finding out what the Trunks' were talking about and stopping Pan from destroying most of the house, Marron desided on Pan. Partly because she could feel her friends ki going up a little to high for her liking. 

Entering the kitchen Marron winced. Pan was on a rampge. "-liked that stupid MAN! He thinks he knows EVERYTHING!" Pan ranted to herslef as she grabbed a glass out of the cupboard, filled it with water, and downed it in one gulp. 

"Who're you talking about?" Marron sat down at the table with a grin on her face, acting as if she didn't already know what and who had Pan so ticked off. 

Giving Marron one of her best glares, Pan hissed through her teeth, "Trunks! He just has to rub it in that he's still stronger than I am!" to puntuate her frustration her eyes flashed aquamarine. 

Marron's eyes widened and she waved a hand in front of her face, "Whoa girl. Someones starting to take on a few of Vegeta's less appealing qualities! One of which is training til he drops and another being his constant growling about "Kakarrot" always having been stronger than him." instantly realizing her blunder she clapped a hand over her mouth, "Gomen nasai Pan-chan! I didn't mean-" 

Pan cut off Marron's appoligy and looked at the ground, "Its ok Marron. It doesn't bother me quite as much as it used to. If he's dead, he's dead, and if he's still alive he'll come back when he's ready." 

Even through Pan's nonchalant tone, Marron knew her friend better than that, glancing at Pan's eyes she saw them darken with something like resentment and sadness. _Pan's never believed her grampa to be dead. _Marron's eyes narrowed, she hated it when Pan got like this, moody and quiet. _She fools herself by thinking he'll come back. When someones gone, they're gone_. 

_Agh! I've gotta get out of here and let off some steam! _Remembering Bra's earlier promise, Pan whirled and punched the intercom behind her, "Bra! You get down here right now! Time to spar!" 

The slightly fuzzy answer made Marron giggle and hide a smile, "No way! I saw the whole thing from my window! If I go into the gravity room with you I'll just get used as a punching bag!" with that the connection was severed. Bra's saiyan heritage had given her power, but of course to get stronger she would have to train, at the moment she was nowhere near Pan's power or skill. Pan had been training nearly her whole life, and Bra had learned one thing in all her years of friendship with Pan, never get in the gravity room with her when she's mad. 

"Why you!" snarled Pan, pounding on the intercom button. Knowing she couldn't break Bulma's saiyan proof steel, Pan had kept hitting it just out of spite, hissing when she hit it to hard and hurt herself. 

Marron shook her head and gazed out the window. Trunks and his future counterpart hadn't come inside yet. _I wonder what the holdup is._

* * *

"So howcome I end up sensing your emotions and thoughts all the time and you can only sense mine some of the time?" Trunks crossed his amrs and frowned, he didn't like what was going on with his future self and the connection they shared. 

Mirai Trunks shrugged, "Maybe its cuz I'm stronger than you. Since we're essentially the same person my power and thoughts override yours." hje wasn't being vain, really. He was just being sensible. 

Trunks growled when his alternate self proclaimed himself the superior fighter, but of course he knew it was true so he didn't say anything on the subject. "So how do we stop it? I don't appreciate all the headaches you give me." 

Laughing at his unfortionate other self, Mirai Trunks started off towards the house, an idea already forming in his mind. 

Catching a snitch of Mirai Trunks' train of thought Trunks slapped a hand to his forehead, _Brilliant! _He couldn't believe he hadn't seen it earlier. _Hey! I thought you were the warrior! I'm supossed to be the smart one!_

Mirai Trunks chuckled and opened the door leading inside to the kitchen. _Okay then, you be smart. I'll be genious. Besides, it's not exactly that hard to figure out._

Trunks' jaw dropped, _Hey! That was uncalled for! Do you really think I'm that stupid?_

Turning, Mirai Trunks shook a finger, "Uh uh. Never, leave yourself open like that Trunks." 

* * *

_Captian's log of the Hope; 51 days after landing: Well its been a month or so since my last entry, at last I know the reason for both Trunks' avoidence of each other, the closer they are the more their thoughts converge. After studying their predicament for a while they discovered that the lower both of their Ki's are the less they intrude one anothers thoughts. Knowing this, the present Bulma has created two pairs of bands for them to wear. The bands completly mask their ki's and its as if they are both androids like Juuhachi-gou and Juunana-gou. No ki means that neithers energy will override the others and that their thoughts are their own again. I sure could use one of those now, I know how it feels to have thoughts that are not your own running through your head at all hours of the day, especialy when you have no ki to raise to disrupt the connection with..._   


* * *

Marron sat with Pan, listened to her talk, ate the sandwitchs' Bulma had left them, but paid absolutly no attention to what Pan was saying. She sighed for the tenth time in ten minutes. 

Finally Pan looked up from her decimated bowl of chips and a few scattered bread crumbs, "You aren't even listening to me are you?" 

Shaking her head absentmindedly, Marron continued to stare over Pan's shoulder with a spacey look in her eyes. "Why?" she muttered, eyes growing dark. 

Turning, Pan saw what, or rather who, Marron was so intruiged with. Wrinkling her brow she turned back to Marron, "Why what?" 

Tearing her gaze away from Mirai Trunks, Marron pounded her fist on the wooden table top, "Why won't he just give me a chance? I swear if he wasn't so strong and wouldn't kill me in an instant I'd kick him!" 

Concern and irritated anger filling her dark blue eyes Pan ganced at Mirai Trunks who was still serenly sharpening his sword, _Like he even needs to use it! _"That's it. I've had it!" Pan hissed, quietly taking her friends hand and giving it a gentle tug as she stood. Following without much resistance, Marron's eyes stayed focused on the ground until a pair of booted feet came into veiw. 

Darting a glance into her friends eyes she saw that the concern that had filled them was no longer the dominant feeling, now it was simply anger. Maybe a little hurt and resentment too. "Tru-san." 

The term of respect would have been enough to get Mirai Trunks' attention, Pan rarley gave anyone respect unless she was being punished or wanted something. That plus the notes of anger made him drop his sword. "What?" his sky blue eyes darted nervously from the scowl on Pan's normaly sweet face to the look of sadness and wetness around Marron's eyes. 

Pulling Marron forward and placing a hand on her shoulder, Pan glared at Mirai Trunks, "I've had just about enough of this." 

"Enough of what?" the look on Mirai Trunks' face was completely innocent. 

"Of making Marron sad! Don't you see what you're doing to her? Until you came and started being mean to her all the time she was one of the sweetest, happiest, people I know! Now all she does is sulk all day because she doesn't understand why you have such a grudge against her when she's done absolutly nothing at all!" her eyebrow twitched and the words came out as a snarl. 

"I haven't done anything to her that needs apologizing." he growled in a low voice, and bent to pick up his fallen sword. 

A sneakered foot desended on the blade, "You listen here! You should see yourself, everytime Marron comes near you you're a different person! Your ki level goes up and you scowl at her if she so much as looks at you! I want to know what the hell your problem is!" 

Temper snapping, Mirai Trunks jerked into an upright position and shouted mere inches from Pan's face, "You want to know what my problem is? My **_PROBLEM_** is **_HER_**! She's looks just like Juuhachi-gou and I would like nothing better than to blast that overly sweet look off her face and right to hell!" the next words came out a bit choked, as if it hurt to say them. "She hurts me more than I hurt her by just existing! She is a constant reminder of how MY world could have been had Juuhachi-gou and Juunana-gou not destroyed it!" growling right in Pan's face, he tried to make her understand, "Can't you at least try to understand?" 

A snarl and a flash of movement was all Marron could see before Mirai Trunks landed on the ground next to his sword. "Pan?!" her voice was high enough to shatter glass, _Did she just hit him?_

Holding a hand to where she had hit him, Mirai Trunks turned a face bearing a shocked expression up at Pan, he looked halfway between surprise and anger. Slowly he took his hand away revealing a red handprint which marred his otherwise unflawed features. "Pan I-" he was cut off by Pan, her ki had risen drasicly in the last minute or so and she looked like a time bomb about to go off. 

"First of all, you're the one who doesn't understand. This world isn't like yours was. The jinzouningen arn't evil, and neither is Marron. So quite acting like such a little brat!" 

"Mirai Trunks opened his mouth but Pan cut him off again. "Don't say it to me." she tossed her head in Marron's direction, with her hands balled into fists at her sides. Pan was trembling with obvious effort not to try and pummel him some more, afraid if she released her hands from their fisted position she would attack him. "Say it to her." 

Obviously still in shock from his recent slap, Mirai Trunks looked over at Marron, blinked twice, and opened his mouth to apoligize, only to be cut off yet a third time by a sharp gesture from Marron's hand. "I-" 

"Shimpai janai. Don't worry about it." Marron tilted her head to the side and smiled sweetly, if still a bit sadly. "I understand now." 

Mirai Trunks was dumbfounded that she had forgiven him so quickly and easily. She hadn't even let him say sorry. 

Satisfied with her handiwork, Pan turned on her heel and started toward her home. 

Marron raised her voice and took a few steps after her friend, "Matte yo Pan! Do you want me drive you? It looks like its gonna rain pretty soon." 

Pan shook her head and waved, "Shimpai janai," she laughed as she mimicked Marrons response to Mirai Trunks' apology, (which wasn't much of one since no one would let him get a word in edgewise) "Don't worry about it, I'll be fine!" without waiting for an answer, Pan hopped into the air and sped off towards the Son residence. 

With a glance at Marron and a frown in Pan's direction, Mirai Trunks took off for his bedroom window, wanting to be alone. 

Marron sighed and shook her head, _I've got to learn how to do that one of these days._

After flying round Capsule Corp to his new room, Mirai Trunks glided in through his window and sat on his bed. Setting his sword in the corner and flinging his jacket to places unknown in the ever growing pile of laundry, he laid down on his stomach and tried to sort out his feelings. 

The first thing that came to mind was;_ I'm such an idiot._

Sitting up and resting his head on the window sill, Mirai Trunks stared at the setting sun. _Have I really been that bad? I didn't think I was glaring or being THAT hostile. I thought I only did it when her back was turned..._

Like most guys, Mirai Trunks was pretty much lost when it came to a females feelings. 

_Pan seemed really mad at me for hurting Marron's feelings. I hope she forgives me. Kami knows she'll be able to make my life miserable from now on if she doesn't! _He gulped. _Oh man! I hope she doesn't sic Chichi on me! _Throwing himself backwards on his bed, Mirai Trunks threw an arm over his eyes. "Kill me now, before Chichi gets me." 

* * *

Dende gave a light, merry, chuckle as he watched Mirai Trunks fret from his lookout. You had to admit, it was pretty funny to see a great warrior like him afraid of what a girl and her grandmother would do to him. 

Mr. Popo gave him a confused look, "What is it Kami?" the round black man paused in his watering of a flower and listened intently when Dende looked at him. 

"Nothing. Mr. Popo, nothing at all." turning back to Earth, Dende fixed his sights on the old junk yard. 

Humming to himself, Mr. Popo had just gone back to his flower watering when he heard Dende mutter a few uncoherent words. "What did you say Kami-sama?" 

The little namek placed his hands behind his back, "Now this," he gave Mr. Popo a grin, "Could prove to be very interesting." 

Laughing to himself mentally Dende shook his head; _My other self must be quite a rascal if he came up with this._

* * *

_Captians log of the hope; 71 days after landing: It's funny how people can have such an effect on some things. Because of Pan's patanted way of knocking some sense into him Trunks is finally being NICE to Marron. He's still not as open with her as he is with Pan, Bra, or this worlds Bulma, but at least he's stopped making her miserable. Juuhachi-gou and Juunana-gou are playing it safe, neither of them has been stupid enough to come within a mile radious of Capsule Corp while Trunks is here. Very smart. I don't think Marron would appreciate her mother and uncle being turned into slag. Pan has finally forgiven Trunks for his treatment of Marron, she ignored him for a few days and then suddenly seemed to forget they had even had an argument. Last time I checked Pan had talked Trunks into teaching her to use a sword. I thought she was going to die of sho-_

* * *

The sun shone hot, the desert sand blew as it almost angrilly tried to cover the remains of an age old dinosaur skeleton. One that quite possibly had been there since Gohan was being trained under Piccolo-san. 

The wind howled, and that was good; it usually helped sooth his emotions and helped him to concentrate. 

Usually. But not today. 

Piccolo's eyebrow twitched as he tried once again to meditate. Once again he fell right out of the sky and only barely managed to catch himself before hitting the ground. 

Growling almost feraly, the namekian righted himself from his sidways position and stared at a lizard the was obviously too stupid to get out of the sun. Maybe if he burned a hole in the stupid animal it would releave some stress. 

The wind around him seemed to laugh, as if nature thought it was funny that one of the greatest fighters in the universe could be blown around as easily as if he were a leaf. _What's wrong with me? _Surely the great demon king could not be unsettled by the wind alone. Any other time he could meditate even if the world were being threatened by a monster such as Cell or Buu. 

Maybe if he went to visit Gohan whatever was bugging him would go away. 

Again, the wind seemed to laugh at the thought and Piccolo was almost sure he was being mocked by something other than just the absent minded and alltogether not alive wind. 

Something had happened, something was amiss, fishy, not good. Something wasn't **_right_**. 

In other words, Piccolo smelled a rat. 

And he had a sneaking suspision that a cirtain young Kami knew where the rat lived. 

* * *

"Danmit!" hissed Trunks as he shocked himself once more on the circuitry of the_"Hope!!"_

"You okay?" Goten looked up at his friend from the opposite side of the time machine. 

"Yeah." Trunks muttered with his fingers still jammed in his mouth. 

The two boys had been on a joy flight when they'd spotted Mirai Trunks' time machine. Thinking it might have a few good spare parts left in it, Trunks had convinced Goten to help him cannibalize the thing. 

Goten went back to pulling on wires Trunks had told him to. After getting shocked quite a few times himself, Goten pulled a computer chip free. As soon as the last wire was cut, there was a whirring noise and a disc popped out of the hard drive. 

Plucking it out of the disc drive, Goten held it up to the light. Perfectly round, (and flat of course) it looked to nothing more than a CD. Just before he could throw the usless thing away Trunks' hand shot out of nowhere and snatched the silvery disc from Gotens' grip. 

"Let me see that!" 

"Hey!" 

Tossing a capsule on the ground nearby, Trunks sat down at the knewly materialized computer and stuck the disc in the slot. "I want to see whats on it." 

Goten crossed his arms and blew air out through his nose irritably. "You could have just asked." 

"Would you have given it to me?" 

"Maybe." Goten wrinkled his nose at Trunks, "If you'd asked nicley." 

With a shake of his head, Trunks entered the files on the disc without much difficulty. Quickly scanning the dates on the documents he noticed something that caught his eye. "Goten? Whats todays date?" 

Giving his friend a quizzical look, Goten went back to dissasembling part of the time machine. "The fifteenth." 

"So its been about a month and a half since my alternate self came to this dimension, right?" 

Goten looked up again and raised an eyebrow, "Yeah. So? What are you getting at?" 

Trunks felt like smacking Goten upside the head, he could be so stupid! "So, the point is that if my other self came here a month and a half ago and someones with him almost all the time and he has a big enough ki he can't hide it from the rest of us and hasn't been anywhere near here and..." 

"Get to the point point already for Kami's sake!" Goten slammed his palm down on the side of the time machine and only suceeded in hurting his self. 

But Trunks had kept going anyway, "... if nobody else has the acess codes then he couldn't have entered ANY of these files!" 

That got Goten's attention. "NANI?!!!" 

Trunks turned his head just enough so he could see his friend, "The last entry date was two minutes ago today." 

* * *

"Vegeta." Bulma growled in a warning voice, "For the thousanth time... THE GRAVITY ROOM CANNOT HANDLE YOU GOING ANY HIGHER THAN SUPER SAIYAN LEVEL TWO!!!!!!!" she breathed in and out heavily as she assesed the burnt and broken peices of the gravity room as well as she could from their second story bedroom window. 

Vegeta waved her off, "Hai, hai. You've told me this before, maybe if you weren't such an incompetant fool the gravity room would still be in one peice." 

"And just how am **_I_** the incompetant fool around here?" picking up the nearest object (a high heeled shoe) Bulma threw it full force at Vegeta's head. 

Sighing as he tilted his head far enough to avoid the oncomming object, (and not missing the look on Bulma's face when she realized what she had done to her wall) Vegeta fixed Bulma with his best "you idiot" look. "I figured if I blew up the gravity room enough times you would learn your lesson and upgrade it to handle higher than Super saiyan two." 

Face begining to resemble the color of a grape, Bulma shook her fist at her mate. "Just for that I'm **_downgrading_** the damn gravity machine!" with a nasty looking grin Bulma raised an eyebrow. "How do ya like them apples?" 

Vegeta was so busy staring dumbfounded at his mate that he didn't even hear the telltale signs of someone running towards the bedroom. He was just about to open his mouth when the door slammed open. 

Trunks burst into the room and stopped in the doorway, "Kaasan! Kaasan! You'll never believe what I just found!" he yelled before falling flat on his face and skidding halfway under his parents bed. 

"What **_we_** found Trunks. We. Plural. That means **_two_**. Me **_and_** you. Mostly me since **_I'm_** the one who pulled it out of the computer." Goten; who had deliberatly pushed Trunks, scowled at his best friend who (being too far jammed under the bed to back out) had had to crawl out from the other side and was now busy picking various sized dust bunnies out of his hair. 

"Alright we. But **_I _**still figured out what it was. **_You_** were about to throw it away. So there!" Trunks stuck out his tongue and pulled down the bottom of one of his eyelids. 

The two glared at each other for a moment, electricity almost literally flashing between them.   
Finally both boys looked at Bulma expectanly only to find she wasn't even paying attention to either of them. 

"Bulma-san?" Goten waved a hand in front of her eyes. The action made Bulma burst out laughing. 

"Uhh... Kaasan? Are you feeling alright? Do you want to lie down? Kaasan?" Trunks looked at his mother worriedly. _She isn't getting senile is she?_

"No. I don't need to." she managed between giggles. "But I think you two might want to go hide somewhere for a month or two." 

"Why?" asked both boys in usion. 

Snorting, she lifted a hand and pointed behind them. 

Looking over their shoulders both boys watched the bedroom door slowly move away from the wall. As soon they could see the wall their faces wore expressions of pure horror. Vegeta grimaced as he pulled himself out of the Vegeta shaped indent in the wall. 

Trunks slowly reached inside his shirt pocket and tossed the disk to his mother. "Here Kaasan. You take a look at that." he grabbed Goten by the back of the shirt and edged around his dazed father. "We're, uhm, **_leaving_** now." he zipped down the hall only to return a second later. "Bye." he then dissapeared and didn't come back. 

Not even trying to hold in her laughter, Bulma keeled over and somehow managed to crawl to the side of the bed and hung on for dear life. "Vegeta! You should have seen your face!" 

With a growl Vegeta turned his back on his mate and stalked down the hall in search of a good book. Preferably one titled "Chicken Soup for the Tormented Siayan Princes Soul" or maybe one on torture, yeah, one on torture would do just fine. 

_Oh feh. He can be mad if he wants. He won't last, besides... anything's worth seeing that look on his face. _Bulma reconsidered her mental choice of words. _His red, squished, bug eyed face._

After a few uncontrollable fits of laughter Bulma felt something poke her in the side. Glancing down at her hand she realized she was still holding the CD Trunks had given her. Curiousity bubbleing up, she popped it in her computer and quickly entered the latest files. 

Bulma's eyes widened. _Oh Kami-sama._

* * *

_This reminds me of a scene I saw in a movie. _Pan circled wareily and tried to find an opening in Mirai Trunks' stance. To her dissapointment she found none. A fist came flying at her face and she twisted just in time for it to go whizzing past her nose. _CONCENTRATE!!! _She scolded herslef harshly while bringing her knee up to slam it into her opponents stomach. 

She got a very satisfying 'oof' for her trouble. 

Mirai Trunks grinned as Pan powered up and began emitting a dark blue aura. He thought she looked really pretty that way. Powering up and matching her strength he zipped forward and caught her small fist in his larger one. Immediatly taking a swing at him with her left Pan growled when he caught that one too._ Wait a minute. I have FEET!_ Tucking both legs up to her stomach Pan uncoiled them straight into Mirai Trunks midsection. 

"Ack!" a scowl crossing his face for a few seconds Mirai Trunks stubbornly held onto Pan's fists and ended up falling backwards because of the momentum Pan's kick had caused. 

Mirai Trunks's hair blew right into Pan's face as they both fell to the ground, Mirai Trunks still gripping Pan's fists. Landing with a dull thud the two part saiyans laid there a few seconds with the wind knocked out of them. 

A few seconds later Pan began to stir. "Owwww." she whined as Mirai Trunks released his death grip on her hands at last. Sitting up, Pan realized that Mirai Trunks made quite a good cushion. 

"For only being one fourth saiyan you sure are strong." commented Mirai Trunks as he rubbed his jaw were she had punched him earlier in their spar. "With a little work you could probably ascend. Maybe even go super saiayn two in a very short time." 

Rolling over Mirai Trunks forced Pan to stand or be used as his personal doormat. 

Pan fisted her hands and stretched them above her head as she stood, "Yeah, well you fight pretty well yourself for a bishounen." (pretty boy) she grinned and wiped her forehead with her hand. "Did you really mean that or were you just saying it to be nice?" 

Mirai Trunks looked down and let his hair obscure his face. 

Pan frowned when she didn't get an answer. "Tru-chan? Konnichiwai! Ossu!" she waved a hand in front of him and finally pulled the long purple hair out of the way so she could see his face. It fell back into place almost immediatly. "You okay?" 

He nodded. 

"So answer me bishounen." 

Without looking up he coughed, "Yeah. I'm fine." he still refused to look at her. He seemed to be transfixed by a rather large beetle crawling near his feet. 

"No, the other question." Pan's frown deepened and she moved the hair aside again and poked him in the shoulder. He was hiding most of his face in the collar of his jacket. 

"Yes. Of course I meant it. I wouldn't have said it if it weren't true. Besides, I doubt that the amount of power someone posesses is tied to how much siayan is in them. Look at you father, he's so strong he can't go super saiyan anymore or he'll destroy the Earth without meaning too. And he's only half. If the pattern continues, who knows how strong you'll be?" 

Pan smirked slightly with a pleased look on her face before turning back to her friend. "Why are you hiding your face?" 

"What do you mean?" 

"Why do you only have your eyes showing above the collar of the jacket? What are you, a turtle?" 

"Er. No, it's just... I'm cold." 

"Cold?! It's 85 degrees out here!" Getting extremly tired at not being able to see his face Pan flipped the collar down and turned his head to face her by holding his jaw. "There. That wasn't so hard was it?" 

Mirai Trunks stared at her with wide eyes while trying not to blush any harder than he already was. 

Pan ignored it and went back to making conversation. "So when exactly are you going to teach me to use a sword? You promised." 

Mirai Trunks sighed, half in relief - that she hadn't caught him blushing; or hadn't cared - and half in exasperation; _This is gonna be a long day._

* * *

"So who do you think wrote these? It couldn't have possibly been Tru-san." said Gohan as he stared at the entries on the disc that Bulma had called him over to see. 

"Iie, it couldn't have been, his ki is to large to mask. Well at least it was before he started wearing a band, but even now someone able to sense ki would have known if he'd gone anywhere near the junk yard. And Pan-chan or Bra-chan would know, one of them is almost always with him." a grin crossed Bulma's face and she looked at Gohan with slight amusement, "You know, I think Bra likes Tru-chan better than her real brother. They haven't had a single argument over anything. But Trunks gets under her skin at least once a day." 

Gohan laughed, "Well, Trunks has lived with Bra all his life and knows how to stand up to her, Bra's got poor Tru-kun wrapped around her little finger." 

Snorting at Gohan's stament to the obvious Bulma went back to poring over the entries; though she did have a small smirk on her face. "It's a girl thing. We females have powers you just wouldn't understand. 

Rolling his eyes in a very disrespectful way Gohan grabbed the mouse and scrolled down a few pages. "Hey Bulma-san. Look at this one here." he pointed at the last entry. "It cuts off in mid-sentence." 

Bulma looked puzzled, "But why would it do that? It's almost as if someone were still writing when Trunks and Goten started dissasembling the time machine."   


* * *

  



	3. Home, Love, Family

Journey To The Past   
Chapter Three: "Home, love, family,"

Yet again another usless disclaimer. I DON'T OWN DBZ OR THE CHARACTORS!!!!!!!! Akira Toriyama does.

Notes: Don't kill me for certain parts of this fic. There's some very minor Titanic bashing. Though I do like that movie for personal reasons; My great gramma and great grampa almost got on the Titanic but the tickets were sold out. Cool huh? And because it was just a really good movie. *cowers from the breathing dragons of flamers* Just don't say I didn't warn you! (And I'm NOT just talking about the Titanic bashing)

* * *

  


_Home, Love, Family,_   
_there was once a time I must have had them too._

_Home Love, family,_   
_I will never be comeplete until I find you._

_One step at a time, one hope then another,_   
_who knows where this road may go..._

"Kaasan, you really don't have to do this." protested Mirai Trunks. "I mean, I could just as easily go somewhere else." 

"Don't be silly Tru-chan. This is cheaper, and it's not like I haven't done it before. 

Mirai Trunks closed his eyes and waited as Bluma neared his head with the scissors. 

* * *

Chichi watched, tightlipped, as Mirai Trunks taught her only granddaughter how to use a sword. No, she did not approve of what they were doing, but she did approve of their being friends and spending time with one another. 

She didn't know how Gohan could let his daughter fight with one of the most powerful men in the universe. Pan could get hurt at the rate things were going. Not that it hadn't happened before, she had had multiple bruises and cuts from her spars with her uncle and Trunks, and **_they_** weren't even at full power. 

Then again she had been younger, weaker, and less experianced at fighting and those bruises and cuts only taught her what she could, or should, have done differently to avoid being hurt. A saiyan could be pretty niave about some things but fighting definetly wasn't one of them, a saiyan's brain could record and keep information on one fight and use it to help them in another. It was part of the reason the saiyan race was so formidable. 

Two identical swords (Pan had borrowed Trunks' sword) clashed and the weilders growled at each other as they tried to force the other one to submit. The taller one had an advantage but the smaller more pettite one definetly wasn't anywhere near giving up. Leaping backwards, Pan raised her "borrowed" sword and slashed at it's duplicate. Not being used to using a weapon, the slick metal slid in her sweaty hands and she almost dropped it when Mirai Trunks' sword connected viciously with her own. 

Chichi bit her lip to keep from wading inbetween the two saiyans and pulling them apart by their ears. Fighting was bad enough, (it had taken awhile for Gohan to get his hearing back after Chichi found out he was letting Pan train) but using sharp blades that could lay open even a saiyan was almost too much. Well, she had been told that the blades wouldn't hurt the two saiyans, it didn't hurt Goku's finger when fighting with Trunks, but she had seemed determined to find something wrong with it nonetheless. 

Pan hadn't noticed it yet due to her concentration on not losing the sword, but Mirai Trunks was methodicly backing her into a wall. 

With a low slash Mirai Trunks forced Pan to take yet another small leap backwards. Giving a short hiss, Pan stabbed the sword towards Mirai Trunks only to have him sidestep the blade and throw his elbow hard onto her wrist. Still sailing past him due to velocity, the blow made her drop the sword and she instintivly swiveled around to face him, she was met with a sharply honed blade held steadily about six inches away from her throat. 

Holding her hurt wrist, Pan broke the silence with a sigh and a shake of her head, "I geuss you win again bishounen." using the nickname she had given him several weeks before. 

Mirai Trunks had become used to this and ignored it. (almost, at least he didn't turn completely red this time) He grinned at her and tossed his sword into the air, leaning to the side he let it fall straight into the sheath with a loud "shing." With a smile he patted her on the head, knowing she hated it when he did that. "You've just got to get used to using a sword like it's an extension of yourself." 

With a small cat like growl, Pan swatted her friend on the arm. "Don't do that." 

Chichi shook her head, as she watched the two poke each other, their antics soon escalated into a game of two person tag. They both looked as if they were having the time of their lives, but Mirai Trunks looked kind of... detatched. Like he was afraid of getting too close to Pan. Or anybody for that matter. 

_I wonder why..._ Chichi's brow furrowed as she tried to come up with a logical reason for Mirai Trunks's behavior. There was no reason that she could see that they wouldn't want to get married right away. 

* * *

Bulma swivled around in her chair as loud bangs and two male voices reached her ears. _What is going on out there? All I wanted was for Gohan to find Trunks and get him to come home. He can't hide from Vegeta forever, besides, I need to ask him something._

"OW! Hey, wait a minute, Gohan! Let go of my arm would you? That hurts!" 

"No. And for the last time, Vegeta did NOT bribe me into finding you and bringing you to him so he can use you as a punching bag." 

There was a low grumble in response and then a crash as something fell over. "I don't believe you!" 

A growl was heard and a moment later Trunks was literally tossed into the room bound with energy charged shoelaces and gagged with a (clean) sock. 

Bulma could just barely hide her amusement. "Trunks, take that thing out of your mouth. I need to ask you a few questions." with a small smile the only indication she thought this was funny she looked up at Gohan who was standing in the doorway breathing a little raggidly and giving Trunks a small, but evil, glare. "Gohan would you mind going and getting Goten too? I need both of them." 

Gohan's face instantly fell into what looked like a puppets with all the strings cut. Catching Trunks had been hard enough, what with chasing him around the continent a few times, but Goten? His little brother was even faster then Trunks! Turning slowly he almost crawled down the hallway. One thought dominating all the others, _I hate my life._

Looking down at her son Bulma finally let herself smirk a tiny bit, "Still haven't taken that thing out eh?" Resting her arms on the back of her chair as she straddled it and changing her voice a bit Bulma cooed down to her son like he was still a little baby. "Does widdle Trunksie poo need momma's help?" 

Sitting cross legged on the floor with his arms still tied behind him with the shoelace, Trunks growled and turned his head to the side so he didn't have to look at his mother. 

She giggled as she pulled the rolled up sock out, "Aw, come on Trunks, don't be such a brat! I was just having a little fun!" 

Now sock free, Trunks refused to give his mother the time of day and pretended that she wasn't there. 

* * *

  
The room was dark and there was a girlish giggle and a small squeal as two figures moved around in the dark. Goten growled at Paris playfully and let a somewhat muffled groan escape as Paris covered his lips with hers. Luckily they were at Paris's house, they would have NEVER gotten any privacy at his own home. 

The glowing television cast an eerie glow upon the two, if you had stood in the doorway you definetly could have heard them but you would have had to have good eyesight to actually see them. 

They were doing typical couplish things, touchy-feely-kissy-wissy cuddling. In the last few minutes their movements had become slightly more heated, but as the television switched back to the show they stopped their touchy-feely play and simply cuddled on a corner of the couch. 

Goten was somewhat sad that the commercial break was over; he had been enjoying himself. He didn't really want to quit having fun when the show came back on but Paris had insisted that they watch the movie and only mess around during the commercials. He was somewhat ticked at her for that but hey, every relationship has a little bit of give and take right? This just happened to be a give moment. 

The actors on the screen suddenly started screaming as the ship tipped to almost vertical. Goten could feel Paris stiffen slightly as she tensed for the upcoming scene. When the ship began to sink the two main charactors climbed to the "rear" of the ship which was sticking straight up in the air. As the ship was sucked under Paris sucked in a breath and pressed closer to Goten. Goten couldn't say he wasn't enjoying the contact, but come on! They were just actors! 

The two main charactors began trying to swim and (oh no!) the leading lady let go of the leading man's hand! Popping back up to the surface the lead actress (Lily) began screaming loudly for her lost lover who had apparently been drowned. Her cries seemed lost in the huge ocean with over 2000 other's screaming right along with her. 

Paris snuffled and held Goten's hand as the lead actor (Jake) popped up and saved Lily from being drowned by a man who couldn't swim and had been trying to use her as a life raft. Goten must have dozed off because the next thing he knew Paris was crying softly into his shoulder. Curiously he glanced at the screen and saw that Jake had just been found to be dead and Lily had just let go of his hand and was crying as he sank into the black depths of the ocean. 

"Oh Goten! It's so sad! She promised she'd never let go!" she hugged him around the neck and he felt his breathing become slightly restricted but tolerated it and hugged his girlfriend comfortingly as rubbed her back. 

"Shh. It's alright Paris." _My Kami it's just a movie!_

Paris jumped and Goten reflexivly tightened his grip when the doorbell rang. Wiping her tears with the edge of her shirt Paris stood and rubbed her ribs slightly. Goten had perhaps squeezed a little bit too hard. 

"Oi Gohan-san. How are you?" Paris, even though her make up was smeared and her hair slightly dishevled from their "commercial activities" she still managed to sound perfectly manicured. She didn't even sound as though she had just watched a tear-jerker ending to a movie. 

"I'm fine, thank you Paris-san, but I've got to kidnap my brother for a little bit." 

Goten, who was still seated with an arm across the couch and his feet thrown up on the coffee table got a slightly panicky look on his face. (well we know where he's been hiding out for a while...) "Why? Where're we going?" 

Gohan wasn't fool enough to tell Goten **_that_**, especially after his experiance with Trunks. "Um, er... Kaasan wants to talk to you. Pronto. C'me on." Stepping outside, Gohan waited for his brother to finish the lovey dovey scene. 

Hurridly getting his shoes on Goten gave Paris a quick goodbye peck on the cheek before exiting and shutting the door behind him. "Gohan?" he called, looking for his brother who had seemingly dissapeared. "Gohan?" he took a few steps away from the door, "Go-" 

Almost instantly he was shoved to the ground. Not at all prepared for the attack he skinned his hands and growled at his attacker before realizing it was Gohan. "Sorry Goten, but I have to do this..." muttered Gohan as he bound Goten's hands behind his back and used a second ki charged shoelace to bind his brothers feet. 

"Goha-" Goten was cut off again by a sock being stuffed into his mouth. 

"Sorry bro." chuckled Gohan as he grabbed Goten by the arms and took off into the sky. 

"Mmph hummgh!" was the only reply. 

* * *

Marron was annoyed. She and her father had been expecting Juuhachi-gou home for lunch for quite some time. They had already waited dinner for three quarters od an hour! 

"Where are they?" fumed Marron. Not only was her mother late, but her uncle hadn't shown up yet either. Besides, if they were gone any longer then the food would be stone cold by the time anyone got to it; Marron had even cooked most of it herself. 

Knowing his wifes passion for shopping and money, Krillen figured she had just stopped into one of her favorite stores and simply lost track of time. "She's probably dragged Juunana into a store somewhere and is subjecting him to carrying whatever she buys." 

Marron crossed her arms with a haughty hmph before turning the heat down on the rice pot. "Well, that's just peachy, they have all the time in the world, but as for us we arn't getting any younger!" 

At this the front door was booted open and Juuhachi-gou stepped in holding a paper bag under each arm, not bothering to hold it open for Juunana-gou whose arms were piled higher than he could see. "Sorry we're late! We got eh... held up." said Juuhachi, setting down her packages and making her way to the kitchen. 

Juunana-gou stumbled to the couch and then uncerimoniously dropped his sisters buyings without even checking to see if they landed safely. He sniffed the air and then followed his twin into the kitchen. He may be an android, but he was still hungry. 

Instead of badgering her mother and uncle what had taken them so long Marron immediatly served them and her father their favorite dishes which she knew by heart. "Eat up." she chirped cheerily before sitting down and serving herself. 

Unlike Krillen, the two jinzouningen looked at their plates; as if not quite sure what to make of them, before digging in themselves. 

Krillen knew the jinzouningen well enough to know that neither one of them was a big conversational eater, so he instead talked to his daughter. Mostly about how good her cooking was. Though of course it couldn't compare to Chichi's. Not that he told her that. 

"This has got to be the best meal I've had in a long time. How'd you make it?" 

Marron blushed slightly at the compliment before going through a quick run-through of the recipe. 

A set of blank blue eyes stared across the table. _How could a daughter look so much like a mother? If it weren't for the fact I knew who was who I'd think I was seeing double._

* * *

The clock's numbers flipped from 2:43 to 2:44 and Bra couldn't wait for it to flip yet again. She loved astronamy, she planned to try and prove the fact of life on other planets. First of all she knew it was true, her being part alien was proof of that. But humans were so STUPID! They had evidence right in front of their noses of aliens and yet they chose to ignore them and pretend that they were the superior and utmost high species in the universe. They were all in denial, most people had even forgotten Cell. 

Bra fumed in her seat, _Just wait. I'll show them. We alien types deserve some recognition here. _Everyone asumned she was just a flightly little idiot. Barely intelligent enough to stand on her own two feet. But they were wrong. Bra was no dummy, she wanted to help her brother run the company, or, if she could tap into her trust funds, maybe even start her own branch of Capsule Corp. 

She had heard the stories of Namek and Vegeta-sai, there were certainly more interesting planets out there to discover and explore than Earth, and she wanted to be part of it! Whatever she could learn about the stars and planets would help her when she actually went out there in her own spaceship. Though she'd have to talk her parents into that first. 

Staring bordly at her desk Bra picked up her pencil and looked at it for a moment before reaching up, removing both of her dangly earings, and sticking them on the eraser. Less bored now that she had a toy of sorts to play with, Bra twitched her fingers and listened to the crystal danglies bounce jauntily against the side of the pencil. _This is sad. A class I actually like and this is what I resort to._

Now twirling the pencil she pretended it was a princess at ball and that the earings were the dress. The princess was dancing, and now a prince was coming over and asking the princess to dance... 

That was when a paper football hit her in the temple. "Huh?" Bra glanced in the direction from whence it came and saw Bunny waving her fingers ever so slightly and giving her and exasperated look. 

Deciding to ingnore her friend she opened the note and began to read. However she did not get as far as she would have liked to because the floor began to shake and the windows shivered in their sills. Bra shoved her desk away with more force than nessicary as she rose and looked around wildly, _What the Hell is going on?!_

"Earthquake!" yelled a student from the back of the room whom Bra had never spoken to. 

_That's right. An Earthquake. Well that's not so bad._ The lights overhead shattered and bits of glass caught in the saiyan princess's hair as she screamed in surprise. Shaking her head to get the biggest pieces out, Bra was knocked down in the flood of screaming students racing for the doorway. 

Sticking her left arm out Bra caught herself and got up before she was trampled, but she was still going to have to fight her way through a bunch of people to get to the door. Tucking a peice of aqua colored hair behind her ear Bra glanced at the window. _Nah. Too many people and we're on the second story, they'd think I was commiting suicide._

The window checked off from her list of exits Bra turned toward the door once again. Why did her cheek feel sticky? Raising a hand she saw a small gash across her palm with a tiny bit of glass stuck in it. _Damn it all..._

Bra wasn't too worried. Most earthquakes were hardly strong enough to feel. Just then part of the wall crumbled and a few desks started sliding toward the opened hole. Then again, maybe she should worry a little more. 

It was pandimonium for a few moments as everyone tried to open door at the same time only to find that it was locked and learning that they had suceeded in creating a very good road block in the middle of an earthquake. Students were screaming, teachers in other classrooms and in the hall way could be heard belting out instructions that obviously no one was listening to. 

Finally Mr. Nebulo shoved his way through the crowd and to the door, pulling out his keys he unlocked it just in time to have the shaking stop. 

"Alright everyone. There may be some aftershocks so I want you all to exit the building in a calm and orderly fa-" Mr. Nebulo was cut off as around fifty people swarmed past him to get outside where nothing would fall on them. 

Bra hissed as she plucked the offending shard from her palm. It looked worse that it actually was, the cut being only a centimeter or so long and just deep enough to open a vein that had spilled a lot of blood. She grumbled to herself as she walked out of the school and into the heat of the day. "That's it. I'm going home and I'm not coming out of my room for the rest of the day." 

Turning, Bra shaded her eyes with her right hand so she could see what damage the earthquake had done; mostly on the side of the school that her classroom was on. The wall that had used to cover her classroom was caved in and some other sections were cracked, but other than that it was just fine. Reaching into her pocket for her sky car Bra over heard snitches of conversation. 

"-see that? That wall's completly caved in." 

"-do we live on a fault line?" 

"-high school wasn't even damaged." 

"-ha! To bad we have to pay for College or I'd be laughing that we got days off 'til they transferred us." 

And with those few short comments, Bra's world was thrown into chaos. "Not again." her breath hitched in her throat as she jogged to where the caving of the wall was worst. Picking up a section, larger than most people could have lifted without difficulty, Bra felt her eyes narrow. She wasn't a fighter, she had never seen battle, but Vegeta **_had_** trained her how to control and use her power to the best of her advantage. 

As annoyingly long and grueling as learning to manipulate her ki had been, Bra was eternally grateful for it now. She was above stupid human things and she knew something that no one else did. There was ki residue on those bricks. 

* * *

"When **_exactly_** did you start taking apart the time machine?" Asked Bulma, leaning forward in her backwards facing chair. 

"About ten minutes before we found that disc." Trunks was still bound and was propped up against the wall in his parents bedroom. Along side Goten who was also still tied up with ki charged shoelaces. 

Wiping a hand across her brow Bulma sighed, "Okay... so what exactly were you doing before you found the disc?" 

"Cannibalizing the time machine. We thought some of the parts might be useful." 

"I was cutting wires and pulling out some computer chips, the disc popped out after I cut a blue wire." Goten piped up truthfully. 

Bulma wrote all this down and then absently picked up the phone as it rang. "Moshi-Moshi?" she listened for a moment, "No. What are you talking about? Of course we haven't received any news about tetonic plate activity." 

A slight buzzing was heard on the other end. 

"Bra slow down I can't understand you. WHAT?! Owari." Bulma slammed the phone down and just a s fast picked it up again, this time dialing the number that enabled her to yell at Vegeta while he was in the gravity room. (which she had by now fixed) 

"What woman?" snarled Vegeta in an irrate tone. 

"Vegeta! Get your ass up here THIS MINUTE! I'm not kidding we have a situation on our hands!" 

"And just what sort of situation would that be? Did you break a nail?" 

Bulma hissed into the phone and squeezed the plastic handset so hard it creaked, "Our daughter was almost killed today!" 

When she got no answer Bulma dropped the phone and untied her son and Goten. "Get up you two." pointing at Trunks she barked out an order that no one would want to disobey. "Trunks go get your sister and bring her home safely. After that I want you both to keep an eye on her until I can get everyone together." 

Trunks gulped at the look on his mothers face but obediantly hopped out the window and began trying to get a fix on his sisters ki. 

Turning her gaze on Goten, Bulma handed him the times that she had worked out in sequence from when they had first begun working on the time machine plus a few of her notes on the side. "Does this look about right?" 

Goten nodded, "Hai." 

"Good. Now go find Tru-chan." she snatched the paper back. "I have a feeling that we may have another Cell on our hands." 

* * *

"What about Marron though?" Bra asked as she flew unsteadily by her brothers side. They were more than 3,000 feet up but Bra wasn't afraid in the least. She still hadn't completely mastered flying, but she knew that Trunks would catch her if she fell. 

Trunks looked a little worried at this but then relaxed. "She'll be fine. She lives at the Kame House and no ones going to bother going there if they want to look for trouble. Besides, she's got both her mother and father to keep her safe. Plus her uncle's visiting for a week." 

With a nod Bra tensed her body and felt herself quit wobbling, she tended to let herself relax while flying which in turn lowered her ki; that meant she sunk. Tensing her muscles had the opposite affect. 

"Who do you think attacked the school?" Bra's worst suspicions had been comfirmed. She **knew** they didn't live near a major fault line, so there was absolutly no way for that earthquake to be as big as it was. 

"I don't know. Was there any indication that it wasn't an earthquake before you saw the wreckage?" 

With a shake of her head Bra "nuh uh"ed and fell silent, leaving Trunks to ponder his own thoughts. Bra, having a quick eye for when something was bothering her brother, saw his eyes flick over to the west every few seconds. 

They flew in silence for a few more moments before Bra gave her brother a look and pulled up to a stop. "You like her don't you." 

Trunks almost fell out of the air. "What? Who?" he had an unmistakable tint of pink in his cheeks. 

"Marron you baka." 

"Whatever gave you that idea?" 

Bra rolled her eyes. "Well lets see. You're blushing. What more proof do I need?" 

"Other Trunks blushes all the time." 

"Yeah but that's because he was all by himself. He's not used to getting compliments like you are, so I know that you're not blushing for practicaly no reason." Bra smirked triumphantly and sing songed, "You're over the deep end. You're in **_Love_**."   


* * *

"Due to recent tetonic plate activity," crackled the intercom, "School is being called off early today incase of aftershocks. Check the news tomarrow to see if we're closed or not depending on what the scientific buearo says. Have a good day." 

Pan stuffed her things in her backpack before jumping up and speed walking out the door. Sure, she could have stayed and talked to her friends, but what the principle had said had bothered her. There had never been an earthquake in Satan City before, and Pan knew there probably never would be. 

Turning, Pan went directly to SCU. Ducking under the yellow police line, she stood before the worst of the wreckage. Frowning, Pan placed a hand on a peice of wall trying to get a better sense of the ki residue. _Funny. I feel like I know this from somewhere, but I just can't place who it is. If I'd gotten here sooner I might have been able to get a better reading._

"No doubt everyone but me knew about this." growled Pan. Darn it. Just because she was the youngest nobody ever bothered to tell her anything. "To bad they're all so predictable. Let's see, now where would everyone go to try and think of a plan to get someone who just blew up Orange Star College? Oh yes. Capsule Corp." she muttered to herself sarcasticly before taking off into the sky. 

* * *

Mirai Trunks was brooding, he had never felt more alone in his life. Of course everyone was nice enough, and they all tried to cheer him up. But nobody really understood him. He had been though the nine levels of Hell and they had the nerve to act all happy that he had come to stay with them. 

Besides that, he was afraid of losing them. He knew the probability of another superpowerful monster once again threatening earth was extremly unlikely, but there were other ways of death out there. Disease for one thing. And guns... okay not guns or knives but definetly disease. 

_My kami stop moping Trunks. You'll make yourself sick._ He was starting to remind himself of a Vietnam soldier. After the war most of them had a hard time getting to close to anybody because they'd lost so many friends during the war they were too afraid of losing someone else to risk happiness. 

And what would make him happy? 

He didn't know but he cirtainly wouldn't find it hanging around here. 

Come to think of it, where was here anyway? Looking around Mirai Trunks realized he was sitting roughly in the same spot that the Cell game had taken place. _Now why the Hell did I come here?_

He was just about to get up when there was a thud and a black blur went tumbling past him at an alarmingly fast pace. "Trunks!" it yelled. 

Mirai Trunks lifted an eyebrow and then walked over, lifted Goten by the collar and set the older man on his feet. "Hey Goten, what's up?" 

Looking as though he had recently had the fear of God instilled in him Goten grabbed Mirai Trunks by the jacket and tugged him into the air with him. "Bulma told me to find you. She thinks..." he gulped and started again. "She thinks we've got another Cell on our hands and she said you'd know what to do better than any of us." 

Mirai Trunks was unimpressed. "So? What's the big deal? You guys are all strong enough to defeat Cell single handed by now." 

"Really? She didn't even tell me what a Cell was. Just that i needed to find you and bring you back." 

Mirai Trunks snorted. "That's Kaasan for you. She really scared you good didn't she?" 

* * *

Pan had been sitting on the couch for about an hour before anyone else started showing up. "So what's going on?" she quizzed Goten and Mirai Trunks when they walked in the door. 

"We think whoever tried to kill Bra by so descreetly shake n' bakeing the College stowed away in Trunks' time machine." 

"Really? But what could have stowed away in there without Tru-chan knowing about it?" 

"That's what we're all here to figure out." cut in a new voice. Turning round they saw Vegeta leaning casually against the door frame with his hands in his pockets. 

Bulma came hurrying in and then out again after barking at them a single sentence. "Sit. Everyone else should be here soon." 

Pan took her seat on the couch next to Mirai Trunks and laid her head on his shoulder, yawning as she did so. She ignored the slight tensing in his muscles and heard Goten snort a little bit. _He's blushing again._ She concluded with a mental laugh. _I thought he was over that._

There was a squeal and then a thump as something ran into the door from the otherside. Goten quickly opened it and caught Bra before she could fall flat on her face; she was still stunned from her not-so-friendly encounter with the door. 

Helping her to a chair Goten sat on the edge of it next to her, quickly relocating himself to the couch next to Pan when Vegeta glared at him. 

Vegeta glanced at Trunks who looked a bit annoyed at his counter part. Flicking his eyes over Mirai Trunks he saw why. Pan still had her head on Mirai Trunks' shoulder and if Vegeta was perfectly honest, he thought they looked just a tad bit too chummy. 

Trunks was just about to go do something about what he saw as his future self stealing one of his best friends when the doorbell rang. Sighing, he opened the door and watched as Pan scooted over just enough for Marron to sit inbetween her and Goten. To his annoyance this made it possible for her to sit closer to Mirai Trunks without it being obvious. 

Mirai Trunks had barely noticed when Marron had entered, he was so used to her being around by now that she didn't bother him any more. However, when Krillen entered he flashed a bright smile to his old friend. 

Krillen waved and grinned before stepping aside to let his wife and brother in law through. He was still watching Mirai Trunks as he did this and saw how fast the young man's moods and expressions could change. 

"Yaaaaah!" he screamed as he powered up and leaped off of the couch. 

"Trunks!" yelled Pan, jumping up as well and turning Super Saiyan faster than the eye could see. "Stop it! They're no threat!" 

But Mirai Trunks wasn't paying attention. In fact, he didn't even seem to hear or see Pan as she slipped her arms under his own and tried to keep him from rushing at the two jinzouningen. He shook her off as though she were no more concern than a fly. 

"Juunana-gou." he hissed, eyes glowing with rage and body crackling with energy. 

"Trunks stop it!" repeated Pan, this time standing in front of the twins with her arms spread out defiantly. "They're on our side!" 

Not wanting to hurt Pan, but dying to get to the two evil creatures behind her Mirai Trunks powered up in frustration and blasted a hole in the wall. "Get out of the way!" he screamed. 

Trunks was peeved at the fact there was now a hole in the wall of his house and the fact that his counterpart was yelling at his friends. "Shut up! Don't you yell at her!" With that he flashed into Super Saiyan and jumped at Mirai Trunks. 

The two Trunks' exchanged about two blows before Pan had jumped into the fray. "You idiots! We've got a problem here and all you two want to do is fight with each other!" she growled as a stray fist hit her in the side of the face. "Shimatta!" backing away from them both she powered up as high as she could and then rushed the two battleing super saiyans. 

Knocking into them with her shoulder she was able to slam them both into the wall. What she hadn't counted on was the fact that both men's weight and power would send all three of them through the wall and into the front yard. 

"Vegeta!" yelled Bulma. "Don't just stand there! Stop them!" 

Growling his annoyance at this, Vegeta leaped through the hole and sent a blast toward the trio. Not powerful enough to kill any of them, but certainly strong enough to knock them all silly. 

Mirai Trunks wriggled out from underneath the two on top of him. No one was going to stop him from getting to Juunana-gou. By now everyone had come outside in order to see the fight, Marron was standing with her mother and uncle, (Krillen is off to the side) Mirai Trunks saw red. He had meerly tolerated Marron for everyone elses sakes, but now that she was the only thing standing between him and his target he would not hesitate to kill her. 

Shooting forward he had almost reached his target when small arms wrapped around his waist and locked. The extra weight slowed him down and eventually tripped him. Landing flat on his face, Mirai Trunks tried to figure out just who had stopped him. Even if he got up now he wouldn't be able to get to the jinzouningen without going through everyone else. 

Looking over his shoulder he saw none other then Pan. She was hanging onto his waist for dear life and had her face pressed against his back. A second later she looked up and her eyes flashed back to normal as she dropped out of super saiyan with sadness, not anger. "Tru-chan I know what the jinzouningen did in your time was horrible and that you can never forgive them for it but our times jinzouningen didn't **_do_** anything. So please, try not to kill them so we can figure out who our new enemy is." 

It was some time before he could do any thing but stare at her. She was right of course. He would have to put his feelings for the jinzouningen behind him so that they could focus on the here and now. 

That just didn't bode well.   


* * *

Dende frowned as he looked over the edge of his look out. Something down there just didn't feel right. Something was bugging him about all of the events that had taken place so far, he just couldn't figure out what the heck it was. 

Mr. Popo had sensed his friends uneasiness and had stopped his gardening for the day. "Dende, what's wrong?" 

"As guardian of this planet I know more about what is going on down there than they do. The problem is the rules." Dende sighed. 

"What rules?" 

"The rules that say I can't directly interfere with anything that happens down there unless it becomes absolutely nessicary to the continuance of life on Earth." 

Popo made a sound of understanding and looked down at Earth. "Well that was certainly something unexpected." he shifted his eyes to another spot and gasped. "Isn't there something in the rules aginst that?" he asked. "Two identical souls in the same dimension?" 

Dende smiled, "My alternate self knew the rules as well as I do and if I allowed this to happen then it must be ok. After all, it's not like she doesn't have a body." 

Mr. Popo looked alarmed, "You consider **_that_** a body?" 

* * *

It was another hour or so before all of the more powerful parties had finally arrived. Some of the weaker human fighters hadn't come, knowing that they weren't strong enough to do anything to help. 

Bulma has just opened her mouth to speak when all Hell broke loose. 


End file.
